The results are in! We have finally decided upon three lucky losers to become the recipients of this year’s Loser Scholarship! We were truly amazed by the volume (over 200!) and the quality of the applications (well, most of them—you know who you are, people who didn’t even answer the questions.).

Our grand prize winner, who will receive a $6,000 scholarship, is Matt Bade, ballerina (rino?) extraordinaire. You may already know him as the kid who wanders around in the Shins’ music video “New Slang” that aired on MTV in 2005. Among many things (like the fact it takes GUTS to be a male ballerina), we loved Matt’s hardcore dedication to his art. He attends traditional academic schooling from 8 a.m. until noon each day, and then drives to Jefferson High School and dances with the Jefferson Dancers until 8 p.m. Three times a week he wakes up at 6 a.m. for athletes training classes. Even though he dances 40 hours he week, he managed to keep a 3.9 GPA!

Our two runners-up, Stephanie Cristol and Evan Long, will receive $3,500 scholarships. Stephanie, a Seattle native, sent us a rad essay as well as a compilation of her music, show flyers that she drew, an interview with Ian McKaye for her zine Shaken Baby, and Teenage Trash, a documentary she made about the Seattle punk scene. How could we NOT pick her? Our other runner-up Evan Long, also from Seattle, started a record label at her school called Cougar Records, and is the principal audio engineer and music producer. Congratulations, you three—go out there and make us proud!