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Department of English offers over $1,500 in awards for annual writing contest

The Department of English once again will host its annual prize competitions. The deadline for all submissions is Friday, March 18, at 4 p.m. (EST). 

The following awards are available:

  • For first-year essayists: The Karl Lemmerman Prize for the best essay written by a first-year student.
  • For advanced essayists: The Holden Prize for the best essay by a sophomore, junior or senior student.
  • For poets:
    • The Finley Foster and Emily Hills Prizes for the best poem or group (three) of poems by an undergraduate student. 
    • The Helen B. Sharnoff Prize for the best formal poem or group (three) of formal poems by an undergraduate student. Formal poems are those written in predetermined forms: e.g., abecedarian, cinquain, ghazal, pantoum, sestina, sonnet, terza rima, villanelle, etc.
  • For prose writers:
    • The Edith Garber Krotinger Prize for the best creative writing other than poetry by an undergraduate student.
    • The Eleanor Leuser Award for outstanding writing for or about children by an undergraduate student enrolled in a creative writing course at the university.
  • For women writers: The Emily M. Hills Award for the best poem or essay written by an undergraduate woman in the College of Arts and Sciences.
  • For graduate students: The Timothy Calhoun Memorial Prize for Poetry for the best poem or group of poems (three) by a graduate student in the Department of English.

Contest rules

  1. Submit the entry as an email Word attachment to sxd290@case.edu. Your name should not appear on the contest entry.
  2. In the body of the email, include your name, student ID number, and local phone number.
  3. State clearly which entry is for which prize.
  4. No submission duplicates from one prize to another.

Please note: Students may receive no more than $100 in prize money without reduction of financial aid, subject to federal and state regulations.