Scholastic Art and Writing Awards – Your A-Z Guide For 2025 And Onwards

 

This article shares everything about the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards to help students who are planning to participate in this competition. Keep reading to learn more!

“We can say for certain, then, that a program like [The Scholastic Art & Writing Awards] doesn’t just honour artists. It creates them. It nurtures them. It permits them to shine brighter, to think differently, to be bolder.” – Jennifer Garner

If you are the person who loves to express yourself with art and writing, then the Scholastic Art and Writing Award is the best opportunity for you. This program is the nation’s longest-running, designed to encourage teenage students to refine their art and writing skills.

Are you interested in participating in this competition? This guide is for you. Here, we’ll share all the details about this program that you must know before taking part in it.

Key Highlights

• The Scholastic Art & Writing Awards is one of the most prestigious competitions that is designed to polish the artistic and writing skills of younger students.

• Only students of age 13 or above can apply for this program and get an opportunity to showcase their inner ideas to the world.

• To apply for this program is simple; you just have to open the website, select your categories, create an account by providing personal information, and pay the application fee.

• Under this alliance, students can enjoy various scholarship awards, including the Flaunt It Award, the New York Life Award, the American Voices & Vision Award, the Herblock Award, Summer Scholarships, Portfolio Scholarships, and Best-in-Grade Award. 

What Are the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards?

The Scholastic Art and Writing Awards are one of the most notable programs for students in the US. This program was first initiated in 1923 to recognise and celebrate the passion of younger school students who want to share their inner voice via art and writing. This program has a wide range of categories, including:

• Poetry
• Painting
• Photography
• Flash fiction
• Comic art
• Digital media
• And more

This program aims to reward and encourage students who are passionate about expressing their thoughts and inner voice through art and writing. The 2025 Scholastic Art and Writing Awards are presented by a nonprofit organisation for future artists and writers. This year, almost 110,000 young students participated in the Awards from almost all the territories of America.

To win this competition, teachers often encourage students to start writing practice by assigning essays during their academic journey. However, writing a compelling essay for this prestigious award is not a piece of cake. That’s why many students prefer to get in touch with a first-class essay writing service like The Academic Papers UK for personalised support. These professional services help ensure the essay is well-structured, engaging, and aligned with the competition’s expectations, increasing the chances of success.

How Prestigious are the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards?

The Scholastic Art and Writing Award is a great talent-hunting program in the US. The primary aim of this program is to identify the achievements of the young artists in their art and work. Each year, numerous teens participate and compete for this award first at the regional level and then at the national level. 

Apart from that, special prizes are distributed to the students whose work exemplifies certain values and showcases their passion for the art and writing. However, the working pattern of this program is quite tricky, so you must understand it before applying for this program.

Read the steps below to get to know how this program works:

• Students first have to compete at the local level, where they would win some honourable mentions, such as Silver Keys or even the Gold Keys.
• The students whose art or writing wins the Gold Keys have to bring their work to the national level, where a huge panel of outstanding professionals asses their work.
• At this stage, students with exemplify work earn a National Medal, some scholarship, or some good work, even published or exhibited in a notable exhibition. 

What do You Get if you win the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards?

The Scholastic Art and Writing Award is a renowned program that offers various perks to talented young students. Have a look at these perks:

• Students who compete at the local level avail various regional awards, including Gold Key, Honourable Mentions, American Nominee Award, Gold Key, and American Vision Awards.
• The Gold Key winners of the Regional Award are qualified for the national Awards through which they can win further Gold Medals, Silver Medals, and other scholarship awards.
• The award-winning students at the national level get a chance to publish their work in prestigious exhibitions and publications each year. These students also get cash prizes, academic stipends up to $10,000 and a tuition-based scholarship, which covers everything from living expenses to the tuition fees.

Thus, if you are searching for an opportunity to express your inner voice and skills, this program is a great platform for you to start. As it is the longest-running program for recognising the visual and writing arts, you don’t need to worry about the assessment of your work. Your work will be judged by an expert in the respective field. In addition, you will get the experience to showcase your skills to the world.

Scholastic Art and Writing Awards – Who Can Participate?

Unlike other prestigious recognition programs, this program is specifically designed for the younger students. To apply for this program, students have to meet certain criteria given by the organisers of the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, including:

• They have to be in grades 7-12.
• The age requirement for the Scholastic Art and Writing Award is 13 years or above as of the date of entry.
• Students must be residing in the USA, its territories, or Canada.

Besides, students have to submit their original and authentic work to this program. By entering this program, they automatically agree that they created this work by themselves and didn’t copy it from another person, business, or organisation. In case of any violation of intellectual property rights, students can be disqualified from this competition and may face serious consequences. 

How Students Can Enter to Scholastic Art and Writing Awards?

The Scholastic Art and Writing Award is one of the most prominent scholarships for teen artists and writers. This scholarship offers a great opportunity for middle and high school students to showcase their artistic and writing skills to the world. Participating in the program is a simple and easy process, but you must know the details about this award so you don’t miss a beat.

Have a look at what you have to do to participate in this prestigious program.

1: Check the Eligibility

The first thing that you must do is to check the eligibility requirements for this scholarship. As we have mentioned earlier that to apply for this award, the age of the participant should be 13 or above, and they must study between 7-12th grades. 

Further, it is also mandatory that the student attend a school in the USA and any of its territories. Homeschooled students and international students are also welcome to this program. If you meet these requirements, then you must apply before entering college.

2: Select Your Category

The next step is choosing the skills that you want to demonstrate to the world. This is quite an easy step as you know what are your strong points. The great thing about this program is that it features a wide range of art and writing categories.

Check out what categories are included in this scholarship program:

• Art Categories: Ceramic & Glass, Design, Editorial Cartoon, Sculpture, Architecture Design, Digital Art, Painting, Drawing & Illustration, Film & Animation, Fashion, Art Portfolio, Photography, Mixed Media, Printmaking, and more.
• Writing Categories: Flash Fiction, Novel Writing, Short Story, Writing Portfolio, Critical Essay, Memoir, Journals, Humour, Dramatic Script, Short Story, and more.

3: Make an Account and Submit Your Work

Once you have selected the category, the next step is creating an account. For this, you have to open the website of the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, click on the ‘Create Your Account’ button. Creating this account is simple; you just have to add your personal and academic information. Just clicking on Done, your account will be created.

After making an account, you have to submit your work to the website. This submission only requires your work in a document file, your work title, description, and your statement, if needed. After adding all the details and uploading the file, you have to click on the submit button, and that’s it. 

4: Pay Participation Fee

Are you worried about the application fee for this competition? Don’t worry, there is a small fee for this award program.  You just have to pay a small fee of $10 for each entry. And if you want to upload your portfolio to this website, then the fees for this are $ 30.

You can pay this fee through online bank transfer or submit it directly to the required bank branch by the management. The best thing about this award program is that it offers financial assistance to students who have financial issues. That means if you have some financial problems, you can receive a fee waiver from the organisation of this award program. 

5: Wait for the Results

After uploading the fee challan with your work on the website of the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards, you just have to wait for the judging results. The result date is usually mentioned on the official website of the platform. In case if you earned a Gold Key for your submitted work, then you would be qualified for the national level competition. 

And if you also win the competition at the national level, then you would get a Gold Medal, a scholarship, or a publication opportunity. Besides, if your work exemplifies the values of this organisation, then you would also be welcomed to the national award event. 

What is the Application Time for the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards?

The students residing in the USA wait all year to apply for this prestigious program. If you are one of them, then you must know the deadline once the application process starts. The deadline for the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards varies from region to region.

Nonetheless, below is a typical application timeline for this program:

• Submission Time: Generally, the submission time for this award program starts from September. The deadline of the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards is December. It is quite enough time to craft the master piece depicting their skills and expertise.
• Result Date: After submitting their work, students have to wait for less than one month. The management of this platform announces the results between January and February. These results are for regional-level competition, so the date may vary from region to region.
• National Level Judging Results: In March, the national level judging results are announced, and the winning students get the awards for their exceptional art and academic writing pieces.
• Exhibition Time: After the announcement of the national-level winners, the management of this organisation conducts a national ceremony and invites the students whose works are good enough to be published or exhibited at the national level.

Pro Tip: To know the timeline of the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, you have to check the official website and confirm the dates for each process. 

Scholastic Art and Writing Awards – Types Explained

As we have mentioned earlier that the Scholastic Art and Writing Award International is the most well-known program for younger students, aiming to support their creative journey. For this support, this platform offers a wide range of rewards and scholarships.

Here is a list of all the awards available on this platform, given on the official website:

1: The Flaunt It Award

One of the most amazing scholarships available at this organisation is the ‘Flaunt It Award’. Through this award, students who submitted unique work get $2,000. This scholarship is sponsored by the following partners

• Flaunt It
• Morgan Stanly
• Don’t Hide It
• RBC Foundation
• HP

The sole aim of this award is to encourage students to express their diverse and unique ideas through art or writing skills. Apart from this $2,000 scholarship, the winning educators also receive a $500 cash prize. 

2: New York Life Award

Another amazing scholarship that is sponsored by the New York Life Foundation is the New York Life Award. This scholarship provides stipends of $2500 to the top ten students whose works are the true reflection of grief, death, and personal loss. To win this award, students have to exhibit their true feelings on loss in the form of art and writing.

3: American Voices & Vision Award

This award is given to the top creative students of each region for exhibiting their original voice through their skills. The winners of this award get a $500 cash prize for their exceptional artistic and literary skills.

4:  The Herblock Award

This scholarship is worth $2,000 and is funded by the Herb Block Foundation. This scholarship is awarded to three students who submitted outstanding editorial cartoon art, depicting their personal thoughts on current happenings, political conflicts, and social issues.

5: Summer Scholarships

One of the most amazing scholarships offered by this program is the Scholastic Awards Summer (SAS). This award covers full tuition fees to attend the art or writing summer program for all the winners of this award. 

Students don’t need to apply for the specific scholarship program; they just have to apply for an SAS scholarship, and the management of the SAS program matches the applicant based on the specific requirements, such as location, interests, and availability.

6: Portfolio Scholarships

The Scholastic Art and Writing program ceremony offers amazing scholarships to students who submit their work portfolios. This program offers a $12,500 scholarship to all the Gold Medallists and $2,000 to the winners of Silver Medals. 

The best thing about this program is that it encourages the graduating students to submit their work portfolios. They can submit up to six portfolios of their works in the art and writing portfolio category.

Each of their submission must have:

• A statement of the writer or artist containing 100-500 words.
• A personal statement having 100-150 words.

7: Best-in-Grade Award

The national level winners receive this scholarship of $500. It is basically funded by the Bloomberg Philanthropies to honour the top 24 students who get the best grades in this competition.

Now that you have explored what this competition is, we hope that you get a better understanding of this competition. If you are worried about how you can make your application among others to win these scholarships mentioned above, keep reading this article, as we are going to mention some tips that can help you.

How Can I Stand Out in my Application to the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards?

Winning this program is the most prestigious opportunity for younger students which play a key role in shaping their academic and professional lives. Therefore, students must work hard to impress the panel of this scholarship program and grab this opportunity.

However, despite all the hard work, sometimes students fail to win this scholarly competition. If you don’t want to become one of them, then you have to follow some effective tips.

Have a look at these tips:

1: Explore the Resources Provided by the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards

The first thing that you must do while preparing for this competition is to check the resources provided at the official website of the platform. Generally, there are three main resources provided by the members of the judging penal of this program, including:

• The art portfolio panel
• Writing portfolio panel
• Overview of the uploading portfolios

All these resources comprise the videos uploaded by the penalists, comprising advice about submitting strong work. They also suggest some ways through which you can make your work unique, impressive, and impactful. 

2: Stay Original

One of the key aspects that the judges of the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards consider is the originality of the work submitted by the students. Your work can be inspired by others, by it must be crafted using your own experience and imagination. Therefore, you must take enough time to develop your ideas and to make sure that your ideas reflect your true vision.

Another thing that you must take into account while starting to work on your project is plagiarism and copyright. Your work must be unique and not copied from other sources. In case you are submitting your work for the writing category. You can check the advanced plagiarism tools, such as Turnitin, to ensure the originality of your work.

3: Polish Your Technical Skills

Are you wondering what are the technical skills in the art and writing? We understand your confusion because the technicalities of these fields are not as simple as other disciplines, such as C++ or Python.

Let’s check the technical skills below:

ART

Below are some essential technical skills that are required for the art competition:

• The first technical skill that you must learn for this art competition is to choose a clear and meaningful subject matter. This subject is the way to express yourself and write your intent behind your work.
• The next thing that you must learn is the proper use of colours, composition, and context so that you communicate your key idea to your audience.
• Choosing the art materials that align with the art technique is also essential for winning this art competition.  

 WRITING

Suppose you are writing an essay for this competition. Here is a list of the technical skills for the writing part of this competition:

• Before jumping into the writing process, younger students have to do in-depth research on their subject matter so that they understand their target audience. Understanding the audience will help them write an impactful paper.
• Apart from this research, planning is also essential to write a piece of writing for this competition. This planning helps the teens to maintain a logical flow in their ideas and develop powerful arguments throughout the writing document.
• The last technical skill for writing is editing. The more you put effort into editing, the more you increase your readers’ engagement. For effective editing, students must start with simple things like checking grammatical errors or fixing writing tone. These small mistakes will improve the overall structure of the paper. 

If you are finding it hard to polish your technical skills for this writing competition, you can reach out to expert essay writing agencies. These companies ensure the successful completion of this essay. The writing experts of these companies are proficient in assisting students to polish their technical writing skills.

4: Use Authentic Voice

The voice in the art and writing is considered the ethereal thing, but in actuality, it is something that is built on experience, method, and inspiration. It is a common myth that finding your read voice is an instantaneous process, and the students often find it hard to find their unique voice in art and writing.

The fact is that finding the inner and authentic voice is a slow and spontaneous process, and requires a huge time to define and refine it. 

Below are some steps to find an authentic voice for the newer artists and writers.

• Start practising self-reflection and try to build your inner voice.
• Understand your preferences and the reasons behind these choices.
• Once you have started evaluating your preferences, start finding patterns in these preferences.
• Recognising these patterns will help you to comprehend your inner thoughts, values, and motivations.

Final Thoughts

The Scholastic Art & Writing Awards is one of the most well-known scholarship competitions that helps younger students to pursue their art and writing passion. Further, this competition is designed to encourage the teens who love to express their inner ideas and thoughts through writing or the arts.

Apart from polishing the skills, this program offers various scholarships, including the Flaunt It Award, the New York Life Award, the American Voices & Vision Award, the Herblock Award, Summer Scholarships, Portfolio Scholarships, and Best-in-Grade Award. 

Participating in this competition is easy; students just have to create an account, pay the fee, and submit their work on the official website. If you still have any confusion, you can visit their website, where all the guidelines are provided.