作者： chenchen

Winner

Vanessa Chen, 16, from Vancouver on “A Sock War Is Afoot Between Millennials and Gen Z”

Runners-Up

In alphabetical order by the writer’s first name.

Emeline Zhou on “Are We Happy Yet?”

Filiz Fish on “What Trump Means When He Mispronounces ‘Kamala’”

Jessica Wu on “When Did Everything Become a ‘Journey’?”

Smrithe Rajesh on “Why Does My Teenager Insist on Wearing Used Clothes?”

Honorable Mentions

Andy on “Test Your Focus: Can You Spend 10 Minutes With One Painting?”

Angela Shi on “People Say Queer People Are Born That Way. It’s More Complicated.”

Cecile Chen on “You Won’t See Them at the Olympics, but These Speed Puzzlers Are World-Class”

Dalida Milly Janevathanavitya on “Have We Reached Peak Baby Name?”

Daniel Liu on “The Tiny Chinese Restaurant That Became an Olympic Hot Spot”

Jiayi Li on ‘Deadpool & Wolverine’ Review: Nothing Ever Ends

Lillian Zhang on “Why Does My Teenager Insist on Wearing Used Clothes?”

Maggie Qin on “What Is Ballet in the 21st Century? It’s All Over the Place.”

Mayaas A. on “Is Decaffeinated Coffee Bad for You?”

扫码查看夏季阅读比赛第 9 周更多获奖论文+导师亮点评析

Winner

Hayne Kim, 16, from Tokyo, reacts to a Guest Essay from the Opinion section, “My Sister Was Murdered 30 Years Ago. True Crime Repackages Our Pain as Entertainment.” She writes:

My descent into the true crime rabbit hole was thanks to YouTuber Stephanie Soo. On far too many lazy Sunday afternoons than I would like to admit, I sat slouched in front of my laptop with my eyes fixed on the flashy fluorescent screen, an unhealthily huge bowl of Takis at hand. Video after video, I clung on to Stephanie’s every last syllable as she fed me one tragic tale after another through spoonfuls of uncanny suspense.

I continued to devour Stephanie’s stories just as quickly as I licked the MSG off my sticky red fingers.

Until I read this article.

At the ripe age of six, Annie Nichol lost her older sister Polly at the hands of a murderer.

Subsequent to Polly’s murder, Annie was continually met with floods of faceless reporters, writers, producers — strangers — all with an unquenchable thirst for details and an eager desire to dramatize. This constant bombardment of the gates that protected her private, sacred memories of her sister caused Annie immense pain and post-traumatic stress.

Suddenly, the hefty plates of Stephanie Soo videos I had wolfed down churned uneasily in my stomach.

I realized just how desensitized I had become. A human being’s lived-in nightmare is not meant to be hastily packaged into a sixty-something-minute monetized video. The inability of myself and countless others to immediately recognize this serves as a testament to the unsettling effects of mass media consumption.

Runners-Up

In alphabetical order by the writer’s first name.

Anagha Nagesh on What Trump Means When He Mispronounces ‘Kamala’

Desi Miller on “104 Shows. $260 Million. After 10 Years, Billy Joel Closes a Chapter.”

Gabriel Lam on “Giant Pandas Will Head to D.C.’s National Zoo From China”

Minghao Li on “If You Know What ‘Brainrot’ Means, You Might Already Have It.”

Vivian Wan on “The Book Bag That Binds Japanese Society"

Honorable Mentions

Yue Li on “Kids? A Growing Number of Americans Say, ‘No, Thanks.’”

Kareena Gunawardana on “The Tradwife Life Is Nothing New"

Amelia Yuan on “Cats Are Better Than Dogs”

Audrey Wang on “It’s Hot Out. People Still Look Good.”

Charles Peterson on “JD Vance, an Unlikely Friendship and Why It Ended”

Claire Weng on “My Father’s Quiet Love Speaks Louder Than Words”

扫码查看夏季阅读比赛第 8 周更多获奖论文+导师亮点评析

Winner

Michelle Zhibing Zhou, 15, from Hong Kong, read the Science article, “Videos Show That Leeches Can Jump in Pursuit of Blood.” Here is her response:

Leeches! Bleh! Famed for their role in medieval medicine, they’re often dismissed as repulsive, blood-thirsty parasites. So, imagine my surprise and morbid curiosity when I stumbled upon an article that added insight into their world and abated some of my irrational fears.

Surprisingly, leeches reminded me of something very different: myself. When I have a craving, like for chocolate, I scurry to the store. Similarly, when motivated by their craving for blood, leeches are “provoked [into] acts of startling athleticism,” springing through the air, then splatting on the ground comically. Adding even more intrigue, the video included ground-breaking footage ending the age-old debate about whether leech-leaping was even possible. The finding sent ripples throughout the leech research community and shivers down my spine.

As with many things in life, the more you know about something the less scary it is. The article helped dissipate some of my fear and disgust, presenting leeches as being motivated by food (like me!), and with amusing behaviors. The article changed my perception of leeches from nightmare fuel to riveting little creatures.

Don’t get me wrong though, while leeches are endlessly captivating, being that, to them, I’m a tasty walking bag of blood, I don’t want them snacking on me in a tropical forest. I’ll stick to watching them from afar, behind a screen, and preferably while nibbling on a bar of chocolate.

Runners-Up

In alphabetical order by the writer’s first name.

Nazira Musabaeva on “After 12 Years of Reviewing Restaurants, I’m Leaving the Table”

Noa Riss on “‘Crown Jewels of the Jewish People’: Preserving Memories of the Holocaust”

Shi Yi Yang on “A Family Dinner with My Wife and Girlfriend”

Sissi Ma on “When It Comes to Food and Politics, Kamala Harris Is Riffing on the Recipe”

Honorable Mentions

Alex Ding on “The Youngest Pandemic Children Are Now in School, and Struggling”

Angirmaa Shinebaatar on “Cows Are the New Puppies”

Blanche Li on “The Most Important Writing Exercise I’ve Ever Assigned”

Erin Yoon on “The Jewelry Shiona Turini Never Takes Off”

Joshua Zhuang on “I Was Settling Into My Morning Commute on the 4 Train”

Lindsey Huang on “What Your Grocery Cart Says About You”

Sarah Guo on “Defeated by A.I., a Legend in the Board Game Go Warns: Get Ready for What’s Next”

扫码查看夏季阅读比赛第 7 周更多获奖论文+导师亮点评析

Winner

Alex Cox, 16, from Bethesda, Md., responded to an article headlined “For Older People Who Are Lonely, Is the Solution a Robot Friend?” She wrote:

Is friendship becoming obsolete?

That’s what I wondered as I read this article, a sick feeling swelling in my gut. Many older people depend on ElliQ’s synthetic friendship. But I share Professor Porteny’s concern that these people can’t “enjoy the beautiful reciprocity that emerges from social interactions.” ElliQ provides something that almost mimics genuine human companionship, but is “almost” enough? If so, what’s the cost of trading real friendship for the artificial variety, especially for people nearing the end of their lives?

I spent last week with my grandfather, who’s almost 96. We had countless conversations over meals whose recipes my grandmother left us about everything from his former job as a NASA engineer to the German dialect he brought across the ocean fleeing World War II. That week, we did more than talk: we connected; we learned from each other; we united generations; we bridged worlds. The most fundamentally human action, after all, is to share.

What if instead of me, he’d spent the week with a robot? Something that could compute but not learn, hear but not listen, respond but not reciprocate? What if he’d died with nobody to share his rich, beautiful story?

Elderly people deserve companions. But they also deserve to have their recipes remembered, their dialects learned, and their stories told after their deaths. They deserve a human. As much as ElliQ can do, it will never be able to be one.

Runners-Up

In alphabetical order by the writer’s first name.

Anthony Babu on “Wildlife Protections Take a Back Seat to SpaceX’s Ambitions”

Cailyn Liu on “Welcome to Stucktopia”

Celina Chen on “What Your Grocery Cart Says About You”

Haiyang Zeng on “I’m a Psychiatrist. Here’s How I Talk to Transgender Youth and Their Families About Gender Identity.”

Joedie Sta. Cruz on “I’m a Psychiatrist. Here’s How I Talk to Transgender Youth and Their Families About Gender Identity.”

Honorable Mentions

Alex Xu on “Elon Musk’s Plan to Put a Million Earthlings on Mars in 20 Years”

Charlotte on “For Biden, a Race Against Time”

Chloe Jiang on “A Feline Scientist Explains Why Your Cat Might Actually Like You”

Ella Gentile on “Shelley Duvall, Star of ‘The Shining’ and ‘Nashville,’ Dies at 75”

Gabbi on “What We Know About the Assassination Attempt Against Trump”

扫码查看夏季阅读比赛第六周更多获奖论文+导师亮点评析

Winner

来自加拿大安大略省的14岁女孩安妮·马马（Annie Ma）回应了歌手德萨（Dessa）在《纽约时报》杂志上的文章 “Who Am I Without My Voice?”

Runners-Up

Qiaorui Zhang on “What Does Anxiety Look Like? How Pixar Created the ‘Inside Out 2’ Villain”

Emma Reznik on “Defeated by A.I., a Legend in the Board Game Go Warns: Get Ready for What’s Next”

Henry Hudson on “Covid Cases Are Rising Again. Here’s What to Know.”

Jianxi Wu on “Is Xenophobia on Chinese Social Media Teaching Real-World Hate?”

Madison Perreault on “Pattern of Brain Damage is Pervasive in Navy SEALs Who Died by Suicide”

Phineas Collins on “Justices Give Trump Substantial Immunity”

Sophie Lee on “My Son Was in a Pyschiatric Hospital. Why Was I Celebrating?”

Vivian W. Chang on “Along the Hollywood Walk of Fame, a Struggle to Make a Living"

Honorable Mentions

Ethan Wu on “Our Pandemic Puppy Brought Pure Joy. Losing Him, Pure Heartbreak."

Anne on “I Saw My Anxiety Reflected in ‘Inside Out 2.’ It Floored Me.”

Christina Htay on “The Angst and the Joy of Celebrating Pride Month in a Small Town”

Lara on “Are We in the Middle of a Spiritual Awakening?"

Lena Singh on “Stampede at Religious Gathering in India Kills More Than 100”

Samira Kennerly on “When Your Identical Twin Wins a Grammy”

Zihao Ye on “Can I Use A.I. to Grade My Students’ Papers?”

扫码查看夏季阅读比赛第五周更多获奖论文+导师亮点评析

每年夏天，在为期 10 周的时间里，世界各地的青少年都会受邀回答以下问题：“本周《纽约时报》的什么内容最让您感兴趣？” 以下是最受官方喜欢的答案：

夏季阅读比赛第 9 周获胜者：‘On Stonehenge and Mispronouncing ‘Kamala’’

夏季阅读比赛第 9 周获胜者：‘A Battleground in an Intergenerational Conflict’

夏季阅读比赛第 8 周获胜者：‘The More You Know About Something the Less Scary It Is’

夏季阅读比赛第 7 周获胜者：‘The More You Know About Something the Less Scary It Is’

夏季阅读比赛第 6 周获胜者：‘Is Friendship Becoming Obsolete?’

夏季阅读比赛第 5 周获胜者：‘A Voice Can Change You’

夏季阅读比赛第 4 周获胜者:‘As a Muslim, Those Words Pierce My Soul’

夏季阅读比赛第 3 周获胜者:‘First Someone Dies, Then Everyone Expects Us to Eat’

夏季阅读比赛第 2 周获胜者:‘Mom, I’m Sorry’

夏季阅读比赛第 1 周获胜者：‘Costco, Don’t Give Up on America as a Nation of Readers’