To encourage high school students in their writing and to recognize publicly some of the best students writers in the nation, the National Council of Teachers of English will give achievement awards in writing to students nominated and cited as excellent writers by judges. Nominees must be students who twill graduate from high school in 1997. South Dakota winners for 1995 are Ann Fishback from Brookings High School and Stephanie Smith from Lincoln High School in Sioux Falls.
Copies of a brochure and nomination form for 1996 have been sent to over 4,000 teachers who nominated students in the past. Additional forms may be obtained from NCTE or from Jim Swanson, College of Liberal Arts, DSU, Madison SD, 57042.
Nature of Awards
A maximum of 876 awards is possible; the awards are announced in October when students nominees have entered
their senior year in high school. Recipients of awards and the English departments from which
they were nominated receive certificates of commendation from the National Council of Teachers
of English. These certificates are sent to the high school principals of the winners.
Because NCTE is a non-profit
educational association, it has no funds to award scholarships to winners.
Their names and addresses, however, are printed in a booklet that is mailed in October
to directors of admissions and freshman studies in 3,000 colleges, universities, and junior
colleges in the United States. Accompanying each booklet is a letter in which NCTE
recommends the winners for college admission and for financial assistance, if needed.
Booklets are also sent to state supervisors of English, to NCTE affiliate organizations, and to the
winners and their high school principals.
Every state in the nation is
represented among award recipients. Each state is allowed at least two winners; the specific
number is proportionate to the state's population. In addition to the fifty states, the District of
Columbia is allowed four winners. Canadian schools and American schools abroad make up a separate
category entitled to two winners.
Eligibility
Only students who are JUNIORS in the academic year of 1995-96 may be nominated for
1996 awards; they must be candidates for high school graduation in 1997. This
stipulation is made so that the booklet naming the winners may reach colleges in time for students
to be considered for admission and scholarships in 1997. High school juniors from public, private, and
parochial schools in the United States and Canada, as well as from American schools abroad, are
eligible.
Nomination Procedures
Each high school selects its own nominee or nominees: one or more juniors agreed upon by the English department, not chosen by an individual teacher. One method of selection is to form a committee of high school students and teachers to act as judges in a local preliminary contest to select the best junior writer or writers to represent the school in the NCTE Achievement A wards. In selecting these young writers, teachers may want to consider the following guidelines: Does the student show depth of thought in the quality and presentation of ideas? Even if the thought is relatively commonplace, has the student made the idea his or her own? Is the student clear about the subject and audience? Does the student demonstrate a command of vocabulary and sentence structure? Perhaps the comprehensive question is whether or not the writer exhibits power to inform and move an audience through control of a large range of the English language. This may, but does not necessarily, imply excellence in what is usually called "creative" writing, and the judging committees may be as favorably impressed by an expository article as by a poem. A prospective nominee need not express a desire to major in English.
A current official nomination
blank for each nominee must be submitted to NCTE, postmarked no later than January 23.
1996. Only one student may be nominated on each blank. No substitutions will be accepted
after the January 23 deadline. All nomination blanks from a
school should be mailed to NCTE in the same envelope, and only one teacher should be designated
I to receive the follow-up instructions in March. All information requested on the
nomination blank must be provided.