Dear English / Writers Craft Teachers,
Your students could win money to help with their education
The Leacock Student Humorous Essay Competition (which closes on June 15, 2023) is open to students between 14 and 19 for humorous stories or personal memoirs . Thanks to our sponsor, Dunkley Charitable Foundation, we are able to offer a $1000 first prize, $700 second prize and $300 third prize.
Entrants may be attending public, separate, private or home school systems in Ontario.
Important Dates
June 15, 2023: New! Deadline for submissions.
July 15, 2023: Announcement of winners
September 15, 2023: Winners will read their works at the Meet the Authors evening, and will receive their awards.
Criteria for the 2023 Competition:
- Entry to this contest is limited to teens ages 14-19 who are students in public, separate, private, home school, university or college situations in Ontario
- Entry will be an original humorous story or humorous personal essay in English
- Maximum length: 1,500 words
- Entry must have a title
- The fee is $5.00 per entry
- The deadline for receiving entries is May 15, 2023.
- The winners will be announced around June 15, 2023.
- All three student winners will receive two tickets each for the ‘Meet the Authors’ night in Orillia – Friday, September 15, 2023 – one for themselves, plus one for their guest. Other tickets may be purchased.
- When preparing your essay in your word processing software (Microsoft Word, Apple Pages, Google Docs, etc.):
- pages must be numbered and show the title of the essay on every page, but no other identifying marks may appear on them
- the text must be double-spaced
- Essays may be entered in one of two ways, on-line or by mail.
Winners will will read their pieces and receive their awards at our Meet The Authors Night of the Leacock Gala Weekend in Orillia, September 15, 2023. The first place student winner will also receive two tickets to the Gala Dinner on September 16 (at which the winner of the 2023 Leacock Medal will be announced), and will receive a signed copy of the winning book, and accommodation in Orillia for the weekend.
This year, we are accepting on-line submissions in addition to the traditional mail-in entries.
Criteria and instructions for entries to the Stephen Leacock Associates Student Humorous Short Story Competition for 2023 are given on our Student Competition web page at https://leacock.ca/studentaward.php for full details.
Please make the students in your school or class aware of this opportunity by forwarding this email to them. There is a module on humour writing on our website at https://leacock.ca/studentaward.php.
Each year we see an improvement in the students’ writing skills and in their subject matter choices. We know it is largely due to the quality of teaching they are receiving.
