Competitions and Opportunities for Young Writers

Each year, the College awards four prizes for outstanding writing by its pupils: the Junior Hopkins Prose Prize and the Junior Hopkins Poetry Prize, for which pupils from the S1-S3 year groups are eligible to enter, and the Senior Hopkins Prose Prize and Senior Hopkins Poetry Prize, for S4-S6 pupils. Class teachers will nominate work by their pupils that they think worthy of consideration for one of these prizes, but pupils are also perfectly entitled to ask that a piece of their writing is entered for the prize. Entries do not need to have been produced for a specific class task; we would encourage pupils to submit work that they have written and developed in their own time. The winners are chosen by a panel of members of the English department, and the prizes awarded at the annual College prizegiving ceremony.

While the Hopkins prizes, and now Lumen, recognise excellence in writing and offer rewards and incentives to writers from within the College, many outside organisations also offer awards and publication opportunities to young writers. Some of these require entries be submitted through the aspiring writer’s school, but most allow individuals to enter independent of their school. The list below contains links to information about some of these competitions and publications, and how to enter.