Travel

Student Writing Contest Guidelines

TransitionsAbroad hosts an annual student writing contest for all currently enrolled undergraduate and graduate students, students who have graduated within the past year, and students currently on leave from school are eligible.

The following prizes will be awarded for the winning student writing submissions:

All winning pieces will be published on www.TransitionsAbroad.

Many of the winners of this contest have gone on to write more articles for TransitionsAbroad.

What We Are Looking For in the Student Writing Contest

Think about what you were looking for when you were planning to study, travel, volunteer, work, or live abroad as a student.

Please follow the guidelines below as a basis of your article, as the more relevant questions you answer in detail, the more you will likely your writing will help and inspire others (we are not looking for highly personal narratives in this contest for that we have a yearly Narrative Travel Writing Contest ):

Where did you go to school prior to your work/study/travel/living/volunteering abroad? What motivated you to go abroad? What subjects or activities were your primary interests abroad? How did you select your program or activity abroad? Did you use search engines, word of mouth, databases, or other communication modes? Emphasize essential practical information such as how you selected a program or arranged your own independent study, job, or internship. Where did you go abroad, why, and when? On which program(s) did you end up participating? Was it an organized program, direct attendance at an academic institution abroad, or independent study?
• Once you were abroad, what did you wish you had known before you left?
• Were there any unexpected events, challenges, or realizations while you were abroad?
• What was the best part about your experience abroad?
• Describe with some specificity what you did in your studies, internship, work, volunteering, travel, living to provide a clear sense of your experience. What you did will most certainly be of interest to others.
• Do you consider your venture abroad as achieving or exceeding your goals?
• Would you go abroad again? Would you recommend that others do the same?
• Did you consider yourself a good ambassador while you were abroad? Did you feel you gave as much as you received from the people and culture hosting you?
• What role did social media and online communications play in your experience abroad? In these times, when we are spending more and more of our waking life online, how did you balance such activity with cultural immersion and direct connection with locals and/or your host family?
• Since you have returned (if you have), how have you been able to fit what you did and learned abroad into your life academic, career, and otherwise?
• Do you think that your experience changed your life spiritually, academically, and will alter your future life or even career choices?
• Did you go abroad with the expectation that the intercultural skills you would develop would help you in your future career skills employers now seek?
• Did you intend to write about your experience during and/or after your experience abroad, and via which media?
• Has your experience abroad, post graduation, led to the work abroad you desire as result, or more likely to related international work from your home country? Many jobs or careers these days involve interaction with international entities, did your experience abroad help you with your current employment responsibilities?
• Think of yourself as an adviser or counselor and your reader as a student like yourself before you decided to study/live/work abroad. Offer your best practical advice.
• Be specific. Vague and flowery evocations of the place(s) you visited and what a wonderful time you had there are not always helpful to someone preparing for his or her own trip. Good writing avoids clich s.
• Think of yourself as a journalist seeking to tell a story with as much objectivity as possible in order to reach a wide and educated audience.
• If you write about your experience as a student with a specific program, remember that the appropriateness of the program depends upon the individual.
• If you write about one program or independent activity in which you participated, please provide a list of similar programs or alternative opportunities you researched for your reader from which they might choose.
• While remaining practical, please do not hesitate to offer your most inspiring experiences and advice. Describe your own personal passions relating to traveling, living, and learning in the country(ies) in which you visited.
• If you feel that anecdotes or epiphanies offer a view into the core of your experience abroad, please provide them as well as any dialog with locals that may have changed your perspective .
• Include a boxout(s) with relevant useful information or related programs that you considered or discovered to help others in their research.
• Note: Please provide high quality and high resolution photographs to make your submission stand out and help convey the context. though we emphasize a command of the written word as the primary form of narrative, since language leaves so much to our readers' imaginations.
• Note: Optionally provide Youtube video(s), links to blog posts or multimedia of any kind that will help further evoke what you experienced abroad and inspire others to follow in your footsteps.

Word Count

1,000-2,000 words. One or more high resolution photos strongly preferred .

The Contest begins January 1, 2015. and all entries must be received bySeptember 30, 2015. Transitions Abroad Publishing, Inc. will require first-time Worldwide Electronic rights for all submissions which are accepted as contest winners and for publication. In addition, Transitions Abroad Publishing, Inc. will reserve the right to reprint the story in a future publication, with additional compensation. The writer may republish the unedited submission as desired six months after initial publication on TransitionsAbroad .

Winners will be notified by email before 12:00 a.m. EST, October 20, 2015 for publication at such time as all winners have signed Agreements, received, and cashed payment.

Student Writing Contest Terms

There is no entry fee required for submissions. Submissions that have been published during the current academic year by home academic institutions are eligible. Transitions Abroad Publishing, Inc. is not responsible for late, lost, misdirected, incomplete, or illegible email or for any computer-related, online, or technical malfunctions that may occur in the submission process. Submissions are considered void if illegible, incomplete, damaged, irregular, altered, counterfeit, produced in error, or obtained through fraud or theft. Submissions will be considered made by an authorized account holder of the email address submitted at time of entry. The 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners along with any other runners-up accepted for publication will be paid by Transitions Abroad Publishing, Inc. either by check or PayPal as preferred by the author. All federal, state, and local taxes are the sole responsibility of the Contest winners. Decisions of the judges are final.

Format

Typed in Microsoft Word and sent by email to studentwritingcontest@TransitionsAbroad. Your name and your email address should be on the document and the 2015 Transitions Abroad Student Writing Contest as the subject of the email. Please let us know at webeditor@transitionsabroad if your submission did not get through for any reason.

Cover Sheet

Please provide your name and contact information (address, email address, telephone number), your college or university, and your year in school or year that you graduated or expect to graduate. If you traveled on your own, list the countries and dates and what you did (worked, backpacked, etc.) If you traveled with a program, list the program name and institution, and the dates. Include your current and permanent address, your current and permanent phone number, and email address if applicable. Include a short biographical note (hometown, major, etc.). This information can be in the body of the email which includes your submission.

Transmission

Send electronically as an attached MS Word file which includes the submission title, your name, your email address, and the story to studentwritingcontest@TransitionsAbroad. If you cannot attach the submission as an MS Word file, then please try to create a Google Document and send us the shared link. The last and least desirable way to submit is to paste the article text into an email message. If you have any questions about the contest, please write to webeditor@transitionsabroad .

Download Contest

You can also download the 2015 Student Writing Contest Guidelines as a .pdf file.

Social Media

Notification of your participation in the contest via Twitter, Facebook, Google+ or other social networking sites would be much appreciated (see our links/buttons at the top and bottom of this page), and all winners are welcome to brag via social media.