E-mail us for more information about the Ethics Essay Contest.
In 1995, TWI sponsored its first ethics essay contest for high school students in one Phoenix area high school. The contest has continued to build annually since then. Currently, TWI receives more than 2,300 essays from high school junior and seniors in Arizona schools each year. Beginning with one school the first year, the contest has expanded to multiple schools with separate competitions conducted in each school.
Students respond to 4-5 questions on a different topic each year. Their essays are judged on the basis of their ability to take a position and defend it.
TWI has awarded more than $74,000 in scholarships as of Spring 2008. In addition, each year TWI awards the teachers of winning students with honoraria to assist them in purchasing ethics-related materials for their classrooms.
In 2008, for the first time, the essay contest had a statewide winner. The winning senior essay at each participating school competes for the winning statewide scholarship. The state winner receives an additional cash scholarship. The 2008 state winner was from Desert Ridge High School.
The purpose of TWI’s Ethics Contest is to promote ethics in community by encouraging ethical awareness among high school students and ethical discourse in the classroom. The topics of the essay contest are written to provoke ethical thought and encourage critical thinking. The writing process leads the student from making a choice to stating a responsibility. The contest is also a way to provide scholarships to students and honoraria to teachers.
The winner selection process is serious and rigorous. The essays are collected from the participating schools. Staff readers vet all the essays from each school, making sure each meets the word limit requirement and has answered all of the topic questions. Those not meeting both these minimum criteria are eliminated. Fifteen top essays are then selected from each school for both juniors and seniors (30 total). These essays are evaluated by teams of five community leaders for each grade level at each school, resulting in the participation of more than 75 volunteers. These panels of volunteer readers rank the essays based on a criteria sheet. The rankings are tabulated and three finalists determined for each grade level at each school. Contest finalists are interviewed by members of their individual teams, and scholarships are presented at the individual schools' end-of-year awards ceremonies.
The state winner is selected from the winning senior essays from each school by a panel of readers based on rankings determined from a set of criteria.
Click here to view the questions from the past three years.
High schools that have participated in the TWI Ethics Essay Contest:
Basha High School
Chandler High School
Desert Ridge High School
Desert Vista High School
Foothills College Preparatory Academy
Hamilton High School
Paradise Valley High School
Patagonia High School
Seton Catholic High School
Tempe High School
Each participating school decides how to involve its students. Some schools require all junior and seniors to participate through writing in a selected class; other schools select specific classes that will be involved. As an assignment, teachers take different approaches: graded as part of the course work; a required assignment as part of a participation grade, which is either graded or ungraded; or as extra credit on a volunteer basis.
Since this contest is an opportunity for students to receive a scholarship, TWI encourages schools to make that opportunity available for all juniors and seniors, but that is not required of the school.
Through the fourteen years that TWI has been sponsoring the contest, we have found that, overall, the most thoughtful and insightful essays--and the most effective learning--come from integrating the essay writing into the classroom experience by both encouraging classroom discussion of the topic and making the assignment required.
In October, the TWI website will have suggestions for ideas and activities that will aid teachers in using the ethics essay contest question in the classroom.
Schools that want to encourage ethical awareness in their students have only a few steps to follow:
- Provide a written statement from school’s administration committing to participation. For form, click here.
- Designate a school contact/champion who will work with TWI in the contest process. For responsibilities, click here.
- State how the school will involve teachers and students
Contact TWI’s ethics essay coordinator, Bonnie McCalley at b.mccalley@ethics-twi.org.
To read what school leaders who have participated in the TWI Ethics Essay Contest have said about their students’ involvement, click here.
(Will be added soon.)
Come back in November for information about the 2008-2009 Ethics Essay Contest.