Enlighten America
Official Contest Rules
Please read these rules carefully before submitting your essay.
Essays must meet ALL requirements to qualify for evaluation. Any contest entry not meeting the requirements listed below, in the opinion of our panel of judges, will be automatically disqualified.
Essays must meet ALL requirements to qualify for evaluation. Any contest entry not meeting the requirements listed below, in the opinion of our panel of judges, will be automatically disqualified.
1. The 2021-22 contest is open to public, private, religious, and home-schooled students in 7th, 8th, and 9th grades in metropolitan Atlanta. Only one entry per student. Past winners are not eligible to participate.
2. All entries submitted to the Enlighten America Essay Contest must be original work created by the student and represent the independent effort of the student. If the submitted work is copied from another writer or is plagiarized, the student will be disqualified from the Enlighten America Awards.
3. Each essay submitted must list the name of their Nominating Teacher or Nominating Parent on the online submission form. The role of a Nominating Teacher is to provide students with support and advice during the writing of their essays. Nominating Teachers are also asked to read students' essays to make suggestions for improvement before they are submitted to the essay contest. As part of this preliminary review process, the Nominating Teacher reviews the essay for syntax, grammatical, typographical and spelling errors and ensures the essay meets the contest requirements listed above. A parent or legal guardian responsible for the student can also serve as a Nominating Teacher. For each class of 20 to 30 students, we ask that the Nominating Teacher submit the four top student essays to the Enlighten America Essay Contest. B’nai B'rith will email every Nominating Teacher an Enlighten America Certificate of Participation (in Word and PDF formats) that can be used for local school recognition of essays not submitted to the Enlighten America contest.
4. All students must complete and submit your essay through the online form for student and school information. Please do not put the student's name in the file name of the essay. Use the following naming convention when uploading: EA2022-EssayTitle-Grade #.doc / .pdf.
5. All entries must be received by Thursday, April 15, 2022, at 11:59 PM EST in order to be considered.
6. Each entry must show evidence of thoughtful reflection and research on the topic. Essays must have a minimum of four sources. All sources must be clearly cited.
7. Students may choose to write an opinion essay, research paper, short story or play with monologue or dialogue.
8. Entries should be double-spaced, 12 pt. Times New Roman font. May be handwritten (must be legible) and scanned as a PDF.
9. Essays must be 600 to 1,000 words. Citations and bibliography are not included in the word count. Please use the “word count” feature of the software to make sure your essay is within the allotted space guidelines. The word count of the essay is required on the registration page. All essays less than 600 words or more than 1000 words will be disqualified from judging.
10. Entries will be judged by grade level based on (1) content, (2) grammar, (3) originality and creativity, (4) quality of expression, and (5) appropriateness to the subject matter, with equal weight being given to each of the five criteria. Judges will look for clear, concise writing that is original, articulate, logically organized, and well supported.
11. All decisions from our panel of independent judges are final.
12. Contest winners will be announced and individually contacted in mid-May.
13. Prizes are as follows: $350 for 1st place, $250 for 2nd Place, $150 for 3rd place per grade level (7th, 8th, and 9th grades)
14. B'nai B'rith International reserves the right to publish and/or display any/all entries in their entirety, or excerpt(s) with credit given to the student author. By entering this competition, each individual entrant grants B’nai B’rith a world-wide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, transferable license to use the entrants’ names, photographs, and/or biographical information for advertising, publicity, and promotional purposes.
15. For questions, please contact us.
2. All entries submitted to the Enlighten America Essay Contest must be original work created by the student and represent the independent effort of the student. If the submitted work is copied from another writer or is plagiarized, the student will be disqualified from the Enlighten America Awards.
3. Each essay submitted must list the name of their Nominating Teacher or Nominating Parent on the online submission form. The role of a Nominating Teacher is to provide students with support and advice during the writing of their essays. Nominating Teachers are also asked to read students' essays to make suggestions for improvement before they are submitted to the essay contest. As part of this preliminary review process, the Nominating Teacher reviews the essay for syntax, grammatical, typographical and spelling errors and ensures the essay meets the contest requirements listed above. A parent or legal guardian responsible for the student can also serve as a Nominating Teacher. For each class of 20 to 30 students, we ask that the Nominating Teacher submit the four top student essays to the Enlighten America Essay Contest. B’nai B'rith will email every Nominating Teacher an Enlighten America Certificate of Participation (in Word and PDF formats) that can be used for local school recognition of essays not submitted to the Enlighten America contest.
4. All students must complete and submit your essay through the online form for student and school information. Please do not put the student's name in the file name of the essay. Use the following naming convention when uploading: EA2022-EssayTitle-Grade #.doc / .pdf.
5. All entries must be received by Thursday, April 15, 2022, at 11:59 PM EST in order to be considered.
6. Each entry must show evidence of thoughtful reflection and research on the topic. Essays must have a minimum of four sources. All sources must be clearly cited.
7. Students may choose to write an opinion essay, research paper, short story or play with monologue or dialogue.
8. Entries should be double-spaced, 12 pt. Times New Roman font. May be handwritten (must be legible) and scanned as a PDF.
9. Essays must be 600 to 1,000 words. Citations and bibliography are not included in the word count. Please use the “word count” feature of the software to make sure your essay is within the allotted space guidelines. The word count of the essay is required on the registration page. All essays less than 600 words or more than 1000 words will be disqualified from judging.
10. Entries will be judged by grade level based on (1) content, (2) grammar, (3) originality and creativity, (4) quality of expression, and (5) appropriateness to the subject matter, with equal weight being given to each of the five criteria. Judges will look for clear, concise writing that is original, articulate, logically organized, and well supported.
11. All decisions from our panel of independent judges are final.
12. Contest winners will be announced and individually contacted in mid-May.
13. Prizes are as follows: $350 for 1st place, $250 for 2nd Place, $150 for 3rd place per grade level (7th, 8th, and 9th grades)
14. B'nai B'rith International reserves the right to publish and/or display any/all entries in their entirety, or excerpt(s) with credit given to the student author. By entering this competition, each individual entrant grants B’nai B’rith a world-wide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, transferable license to use the entrants’ names, photographs, and/or biographical information for advertising, publicity, and promotional purposes.
15. For questions, please contact us.
Meet Our 2021-2022 Enlighten America Judges
Vic AnapolleVic is the immediate past chair of the Enlighten America Contest and serves as Judge Coordinator for the 2021-2022 year.
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Marcus BrodzkiMarcus is the Enlighten America Program Coordinator for 2021-2022 and previously served as a judge for the past two years.
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RuthE LevyRuthE is an Enlighten America judge and owner of And Thou Shalt Read books and OyToys in Roswell, GA. Additionally, RuthE has generously donated books to past winners of Enlighten America.
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