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Writing for Children Competition 2017
CANSCAIP (Canadian Society of Children’s Authors, Illustrators and Performers) is pleased to have received hundreds of entries for the 20th annual Writing for Children Competition. The deadline for entries was June 30, 2017.
The writers have not previously been published in any genre. A goal of the Writing for Children Competition is to discover, encourage, and promote new writers of children's literature across Canada. The Writers' Union of Canada initiated the Competition in 1996, and in 2014 CANSCAIP took on this initiative.
Two winners will be awarded $1,000 for a picture book/early reader entry and for a chapter book/middle grade/young adult entry. Eight additional finalists in these categories will also be selected.
CANSCAIP submits the winners and finalists to three Canadian children's publishers for consideration. Some winners and finalists in the Writing for Children Competition have had their entries published.
All entrants receive feedback from the readers who evaluate the entries. This feedback is a unique benefit of entering the Writing for Children Competition. The readers are all published writers with experience in the reading age category they are evaluating.
HOW ENTRIES ARE EVALUATED
- First-round readers evaluate a large group of entries in a reading age category, and select a smaller group of entries to proceed to the second-round readers. The first-round readers are professionally published authors with experience in the reading age categories they evaluate.
- The second-round readers are a different group of professionally published authors. Second-round readers evaluate a smaller group of entries and select entries to proceed to the jury.
- There are two juries: a jury for Picture Book/Early Reader and a jury for Chapter Book/Middle Grade/Young Adult. Each jury selects the four finalists and one winner; there will be eight finalists and two winners overall.
- The finalists and winners are submitted to three Canadian children's publishers for consideration.
EVALUATION FEEDBACK
- Feedback for the writers from the readers who evaluate the entries is a unique benefit of entering the Writing for Children Competition.
- All the writers will get feedback from the first-round readers.
- Writers whose entries progress to the next stage also get feedback from the second-round readers.
- The content and length of the feedback varies with the individual reader; feedback is generally several sentences or a short paragraph.
- A reader's feedback reflects the opinions and experience of that particular reader -- another reader's feedback of the same entry might be quite different. (This is also the case when publishers evaluate manuscripts -- different editors will have different opinions about the same manuscript.)
- All the writers will be emailed the feedback in December.
TIMELINE FOR 2017 COMPETITION
NOTE: The timeline for the press release and feedback has been delayed, and the new timeline is shown below. We know that everyone has been waiting for the results, and we sincerely apologize for the delay. Thank you for your continued patience.
- JUNE 30: Deadline for submissions
- JULY & AUGUST: Submissions evaluated by first-round readers
- SEPTEMBER & OCTOBER: Submissions evaluated by second-round readers
- DECEMBER: Announcement of longlist
- JANUARY: Announcement of finalists and winners. Feedback from first-round readers sent to all entrants; feedback from second-round readers sent to selected entrants
READING AGE CATEGORIES
- Picture Book (age 2 to 6)
- Early Reader (age 5 to 8)
- Chapter Book (age 7 to 10)
- Middle Grade (age 9 to 12)
- Young Adult (age 13 and up)