The 5th Annual SLC Undergraduate Writing Contest opens November 29th

 

Welcome back! Student Learning Commons services are here for you -- both in-person and online.

 

A pencil that looks like a rocket, blasting off

The Student Learning Commons invites all undergraduate students to enter the 5th annual writing contest. 

Students are invited to submit a paper written for an SFU undergraduate course during the 2021 calendar year (January-December). Although papers must have originally been written for a course, they can be revised for the writing contest to ensure they meet the contest criteria. 

New this year: the contest features a category open to first year, first semester students, as well as a Plurilingual Prize. The Plurilingual Prize is designed to celebrate excellent writing that engages with multiple languages, multiple Englishes, and a variety of plurilingual rhetorical strategies. You can read more about the updates to the contest in this SFU News story.   

Cash prizes will be awarded to the first and second place winners in each category. All contest winners and honourable mentions will be published in an open access writing contest journal. 

Co-authored papers can be submitted to the contest. In such cases, one author will complete the submission process, however, all co-authors must agree to the submission. In the case where a co-authored paper wins, the prize money will be divided equally among all co-authors. 

How to enter and other details

For more, including all contest details, the submission page, and past winners, see the SLC Writing Contest journal Contest Information page.  

Spotlight on a 2020 winner 

Jonson Lee won 1st Prize in the Upper Division Category (now the Fourth Year+ Category) in the 2020 contest for the paper "Jellies and Fish: A Bad Sting for Fisheries."

Here is what Jonson had to say about the contest: 

 
Why did you want to enter the contest?
 

I wanted to enter because it seemed interesting, there was nothing really to lose from entering, and I had a very recent paper I wrote for a course I took in the previous semester that I did well on, so i thought I would enter and just see what happened.

 

 

What did you enjoy about the contest?
 

I enjoyed seeing and learning about some of the wide variety of papers from other students in faculties outside of my own (science). The cash prize was also quite nice.

 

 

 
What are you doing now?
 

I am currently working as a research assistant under Dr. Ronald Ydenberg as part of the Center for Wildlife Ecology. My research project involves using bird observation data from an online database to determine how the presence of Cooper's hawks in North America affects the migration timing of migratory prey species. 

 

 

 

Date(s)
November 29 - January 2
Contact for further information
slc-writing-contest@sfu.ca