KEMPA offers several individual contest categories in News-Print & Online, Yearbook, Broadcast, and Photography for student work published by member schools in the 2021-22 school year.
We have updated several of our categories this year, so please take note of these new categories. This contest is an opportunity for your students to enter their individual work to compete against other student journalists as writers, photographers, designers, and multimedia journalists.
This contest does not replace KEMPA’s yearly critique and competition for your overall publication, however, so please be sure to enter your publication for a chance to earn a separate award for your publication as a whole!
Unlike other mail-in competitions, KEMPA’s contest is entirely online and welcomes each school to enter an unlimited number of individual entries. We don’t want any students left out!
Student entries will be judged by impartial, qualified, out-of-state experts in scholastic journalism; no KEMPA members will act as judges in this competition.
Judges will choose Best Of Show, Superior, Excellent, and Honorable Mention winners for each category. Winners will be announced at the annual KEMPA Fall Scholastic Journalism Conference in October and winning work will be published at
www.kempajournalism.org/ so all students can learn from and use the winning products as models.
Please read the materials and information below carefully! Specific instructions regarding deadlines, categories, and how to submit each entry are provided on each individual category form (links below).
These guidelines must be followed correctly; submissions failing to follow the rules will be disqualified. This is an entirely online contest; we will not accept physical tearsheets or printouts of student work.
Entries must be uploaded to the Google entry form. The deadline for submissions is June 17th. Please refer to the specific entry directions listed for each category. If you have questions, please do not hesitate to contact KEMPA.
We hope your students and your publication will take advantage of this opportunity and wish you the best of luck in the competition!
Sincerely,
Michelle Corbett, KEMPA Individual Contests Chair