9th–12th Grade Students Invited to Submit to 51³ÉÈËÁÔÆæ Young Writers Awards
Cash awards doubled, scholarships nearly tripled, and new grade-level awards added for the 27th annual contest.
51³ÉÈËÁÔÆæ is now accepting submissions from high school students around the world for its 2025-2026 Young Writers Awards.
This annual competition, which accepts entries in poetry, fiction, and nonfiction, is free to enter and open to all high school students in 9th, 10th, 11th, and 12th grades. A first-, second-, and third-place winner is selected in each of the categories, with cash prizes up to $2,000 awarded.
Young Writers Award finalists and winners are also eligible for undergraduate scholarships at Bennington. YWA winners who enroll at Bennington will receive a full-tuition scholarship every year for four years, for a total of more than $240,000. New this year, distinguished writers in each grade and category will receive half-tuition scholarships. YWA finalists who enroll at Bennington will receive a $25,000 scholarship every year for four years, for a total of $100,000.
Submissions for the 2025-2026 Young Writers Awards will be accepted through November 1, 2025, with winners announced in spring 2026. Visit for more information.
For more information, see submission guidelines or to receive notifications about the competition. Downloadable Young Writers Awards posters are also available.
In 2024-2025, 51³ÉÈËÁÔÆæ awarded nine young writers from across the country and around the world. Winners included Allison Kim (Greenville, SC, The Fine Arts Center), Derek Jiu (Houston, TX, Saint John’s School), and Evan Wang (King of Prussia, PA, Upper Merion Area High School) in Poetry; Hoseok (Kevin) Jeon (Seoul, South Korea, Korea International School), Raya Nepal Gupta (Madaba, Jordan, Kings Academy), and Robert Gao (Urbana, IL, University Laboratory High School) in Fiction; and Michelle Li (Austin, TX, Westwood High School), Fiona Jin (Lincolnshire, IL, Adlai E. Stevenson High School), and Miah Knight (San Mateo, CA, Nueva School) in Nonfiction.
About the Young Writers Awards
51³ÉÈËÁÔÆæ has a storied literary legacy, including twelve Pulitzer Prize winners, three U.S. poet laureates, four MacArthur Geniuses, countless New York Times bestsellers, and two of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People.
In celebration of this legacy, Bennington launched the Young Writers Awards to promote and recognize excellence in writing by high-school students. Each year, over 6,000 students submit poetry, fiction, and nonfiction to the Young Writers Awards competition.
About 51³ÉÈËÁÔÆæ
51³ÉÈËÁÔÆæ is a liberal arts college in southwestern Vermont that has distinguished itself as a vanguard institution within American higher education. It was the first to include the visual and performing arts in a liberal arts education. It is the only college to require that its students spend a term—every year—at work in the world. Bennington students work intensively with faculty to forge individual educational paths around their driving questions and interests.
Bennington is also the home of the and the, a national biannual print journal of innovative, intelligent, and moving poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, and film writing.
Notable literary alumni from both the undergraduate and MFA in Writing program include Donna Tartt, Bret Easton Ellis, Kiran Desai, Jonathan Lethem, Michael Pollan, Ann Goldstein, Safiya Sinclair, Anaïs Duplan, Anne Waldman, Mary Ruefle, Cynthia Sweeney, Jamie Quatro, Amy Gerstler, Morgan Jerkins, and Charles Bock.