Essay Contest for High School Students

Here’s your chance to write a new profile in courage.
Enter the John F. Kennedy Profiles in Courage Essay Contest!

1st place wins $5,000 and a trip to Boston to accept the award at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum. 2nd place wins $1,000 and up to 5 finalists will win $500.

Students are encouraged to write an original essay about an elected official who has demonstrated political courage. The contest is a companion program of the Profile in Courage Award, named for President Kennedy’s 1957 Pulitzer Prize-winning book.

Complete information on how to prepare and submit (online submission only) is available at http://www.jfklibrary.org/ the library’s official website. Once at the JFK Library website mouse over the link box at the right titled Education and Public Programs and select the Profile in Courage Award link. Then click on the link in the left hand column for the Essay Contest. Be sure to read ALL the information including the portion about what teachers can and need to do.

This contest takes a good amount of research and has very specific presentation guidelines. Be sure to read all about it, but please DO consider entering!

The entry submission deadline is January 10, 2009.

Writing Contest - "Letter About Literature"

Read. Be Inspired. Write Back.

This is a great contest for kids age 9 and up, whether they are interested in writing or need to be encouraged to write. It is not at all like writing an essay or a paper for school. It is pretending to write a letter to an author and the entrant expressing themself about what they have read through the letter.

Entrants select a fiction or nonfiction book, a short story, poem, essay or speech they have read and about which they had strong feelings. Then they are encouraged to explore those feelings and why they reacted as they did during or after reading the author’s work.

There are three levels of competition...
Level 1 – Grades 4-6, no less than 100 words and no more than 400 words
Level 2 – Grades 7 & 8, no less than 300 words and no more than 600 words
Level 3 – Grades 9-12, no less than 500 words and no more than 800 words

For complete rules and entry forms stop by the library and ask or go to http://www.loc.gov/letters Winners at the state level receive a $50 gift card for Target and will advance to National Level Judging. National level winners receive a $500 Target gift card and a $10,000 Reading Promotion Grant for their community library!

Entry deadline is December 6, 2008.