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alrighty so we're gonna get started um so hi everyone um and welcome thank you so much for joining uh for today's training webinar um my name is manny blasco i'm a programs coordinator here um for the region at large and new york city programs here at the scholastic awards and i'm joined by my colleagues katie bonner and hailey henriquez um if they want to just say hi real quick hi everyone my name is katie bonner and i work with our region at large programs and supporting our program run by affiliate partners so all other regions around the country thanks for joining us hello everyone my name is hero enriquez and i work with the new york city scholastic awards awesome well thank you both so much um so today we're going to be covering how students can enter the 2021 scholastic awards from home and how parents and guardians can support them in the process um so just a quick note for any um educators that are joining us today um while today's session is mainly student focused please note that the process for creating and navigating an educator account is somewhat similar so this session will still be helpful for you we also had an educator focus session a few weeks ago um and you can find the recording on youtube um at this link um with katie or hilo you want to drop in uh the link into the chat box we definitely encourage educators to view this in case you have any um educator specific questions that aren't covered in today's session but again of course please feel free to ask any questions during our session today as well either in the q and a box um which you can find in your um toolbar there should be a button that says q a you can drop in a question there and hadel and katie will be able to assist um or we're gonna save questions um at the end also during our q a session which will be about the last 15 15 minutes or so all right so let's jump right in so first today we'll be covering a brief introduction to the scholastic awards um and then of course a step-by-step walkthrough of the entry process for students if you are attending this webinar you are either in our region at large new york city international or another regional program for art writing or both you can check which regions you belong to directly in your account or by checking your school zip code on the my regions page of our website at rnwriting.org which i will also walk through on how to do later on and as i mentioned lastly during the last 15 minutes of our time together we'll have a q a session um we did try to build in as many questions as we could into this presentation that we've received from students but anything that we miss please feel free to ask again in the q a box um and this is separate than the chat box we do ask that you um refrain from using the chat box only ask questions in the q a box um or again at the end of the session so as we do have a lot to cover my colleagues again will be answering the questions in the box um and while we may not be able to get to every single question today um we do invite you to email us at ral artandwriting.org and we'll get back to you promptly there as well um also for anyone who joined late um i do want to just let you know that today's web cart excuse me today's webinar is being recorded so please don't stress about missing anything it will be recorded and shared via email with everyone in attendance okay so we're just going to run through a couple quick norms for the webinar um so everyone is going to be muted during this again so please drop questions in the box um that way it helps streamline questions um and while i won't be answering any questions during the presentation again my colleagues will be and we'll hold them at the end during our q and a session so let's jump right into it so just to give a brief introduction to the awards uh the awards were started in 1923 by the founder of the scholastic publishing company the awards was originally founded as a recognition program for young creatives founded during a time where literary opportunities were limited especially for young people the alliance for young artists and writers has grown exponentially since inception the alliance identifies teenagers with exceptional artistic and literary talents and through the scholastic art and writing awards platform it connects creative youth with opportunities for recognition exhibition publication and scholarships students across america submitted nearly 300 000 original works in 2020 in 29 different categories of art and writing so next we're going to take a quick look at our year at a glance so the awards opened for entry on september 1st this past september so right now students are in the phase where they are creating an original piece of art or writing and entering it directly to the program through their student dashboard your educators also have the opportunity at this time to create their own dashboards where they can support you with your entries so the deadlines for entries varies by region um but they all begin on december 1st again but they vary so this is coming up pretty quickly after thanksgiving um so that's just something to keep in mind as you work um and you may have a different deadline for your other entries as well depending if you are entering art writing or both so when we look at the entry process in a moment we'll point out where you can find your art and writing deadlines and all students who enter to the original awards in the fall are considered for our honorable mention silver key and gold key awards all students who receive our highest honor at the regional level our gold key award are then automatically considered for a national award and our national gold medalists are then invited to carnegie hall in june so this is really just the beginning of a full school year of programming through the scholastic awards and we are super excited to be spending that time with you um and celebrating your achievements also just want to call out a quick note for this year's events while at this time we don't know if regional and national ceremonies and exhibitions will be in person or virtual due to covet 19 um we want to rest um rest assured that students will be celebrated one way or the other all right moving on how to enter the awards that's really what we're here for so you're going to want to follow these three easy steps to enter the award first you're going to create an account at artandwriting.org second you're going to upload a piece of original work and then three you're going to complete your entry by the deadline again deadlines vary by region starting december 1st so be sure to check your art in writing deadlines either in your account or on the my region page of our website at artwriting.org pro tip for students creating accounts we highly recommend including an email that you check regularly such as a personal email school emails um often deactivate over the summer or upon graduation so you won't be able to use them when uploading original work it is imperative to note all of the works you might have referenced to gather inspiration this will confirm that you have not plagiarized your original work um so please keep this in mind um and oh sorry also to keep in mind all entries entered are going to be digitally uploaded so this will require students and parents or guardians to print sign and upload both entry and payment forms or digitally sign all forms to complete the entry so a completed entry consists of a signed entry form by the way new this year educator signatures are not required they have been in the past but not this year and you will also need a completed entry fee which can either be paid via paypal or by mailing in a check but again that depends on your region and you'll see all of your instructions in your account um the third option um for completing entry fee um is through a fee waiver um and this is if um payment poses a barrier to your participation to the awards but again we'll take a look at all of this what it looks like in a moment when we actually start reviewing the process so next we're going to talk a little bit about entry fees and fee waivers so the entry fee for individual works is seven dollars and 25 for portfolios depending on your region payments must be processed digitally through paypal and students will be required to upload a payment form to their account to confirm payment or you may also have the option to mail a check and your payment form but again this completely depends on your region check your account or your region's web pages to find out more about your payment options for students whom the entry fee poses a barrier to participation as i mentioned before they can access a fee waiver through their student accounts and like digital payment forms fee waivers must be signed by a parent or guardian prior to being digitally uploaded also if you know that your educator is interested in bulk payment for student entries please have your educator reach out to your regional manager and you can find your regional manager's contact information in your regional programs web pages again which you can find through your account or using the my region page at artwriting.org next let's talk a little bit about categories so this year we have 28 different categories of art and writing that students can enter to in addition to a number of what we call our direct scholarships which these are just additional opportunities for record for recognition all of this is available on our website at artwriting.org and i would encourage you all to check it out for more information um so two things i want to call out that are new this year um two important category changes the first one is we have a new category um called expanded projects um and we recommend that you check out the categories page for more information um katie and halo if you wanted to drop that in to the chat box um and then the second important change this year is um for seniors only um students in 12th grade um this is in regards to portfolios seniors now only need to upload six works instead of eight in uh for a portfolio um this was a change we felt that would make it easier for students and educators transitioning to virtual learning also to note a written statement is now required to enter a portfolio and again we'll walk through this process later on on showing how seniors can enter portfolios and lastly again we just encourage all students that are considering applying to read the category category descriptions on our website to make sure that they are accurately submitting into the appropriate category so now i'm sure that you're wondering how works are actually selected so first and foremost the entries undergo a blind adjudication process where jurors can not access personal student information to ensure that entries are judged only on merit this is why the scholastic awards ask you not to provide identifiers such as your name age race or ethnic background or regional location etc in your work title so judges make their decisions based on the excellence of three criteria um the first one being originality second one technical skill and third one emergence of personal voice or vision some of the questions that the judges ask themselves when considering the three criteria are is the submission original is it different surprising or unexpected does the submission go beyond what began as a classroom assignment does the submission demonstrate technical skill the importance of technical skill lies in how the student uses their technique and tools to communicate their ideas concepts and expressions in an innovative way and lastly is there a personal voice or vision is it unique does it make you curious are you moved by it so as you're creating and editing ask yourselves these questions to help guide you in the right direction and who are our judges entries are judged by a group of talented individuals working in the literary or creative arts in your region's community we utilize the skill sets and expertise of people in different areas to get a ton of different perspectives on each piece of student work that comes through each regional program this diverse pool of jurors includes talented local writers and artists uh whether it be artists with an exhibition currently open at a gallery um or recently published writer um their region's own local educators curators editors or any of the above so now we are about to jump into actually reviewing the entry process together um before i get into that if anyone has any questions please feel free to type them directly into the q a box if you haven't been doing so already all right so we're going to move in now to the actual entry process so i'm going to switch my screens to our inverting.org give me one moment as i get my materials ready all right so you'll see here that we are at our website our main website artandwriting.org so on this page you're going to see three key buttons um that sort of serve as guide posts for navigating this process the first one is um our how to enter page so what you're gonna do is go to this button here the awards and you're going to see this button here how to enter so this page just sort of lays out the bare bones of the submissions process so for example how to complete your entry category descriptions and just generally what happens next the second key button and as i was describing earlier so i'm happy that we can now jump to it so you all can see it is the my region button so here all right let's pretend like we started over here um is where you're going to find your regional web pages and your deadlines so we're going to start first by entering our school zip code so i already have one preset and we're going to choose our area of interest as both art and writing um but if you're only submitting art or only writing you can choose those options as well and then you're going to click find region so now this is going to bring you to your regional web pages so if you scroll down you'll be able to see you know all of your guidelines for your specific region instructions on how to enter all very important information that you're going to need you'll also see on the right here in this blue box um probably the most important thing is your art or writing deadline um so you're always going to want to you know mark this in your calendar um you can always come back to your regional webpage for any information that you need also if you are submitting both art and writing you can switch this button right here to toggle between your art and writing web pages again this is important to note because um depending on your art or writing region you may actually have um different deadlines and you may have different information on how to submit for both art and writing all right so now that we covered those the last button and probably the most important is actually starting and getting and creating your account so what you're going to do is click login here and now we can get started so when you first get to this page obviously it's pre-filled with my information but if you are a new student actually i'll say this first if you're a returning student you would input your information here and click login if you are a new student you're going to click this button here create new account and choose i am a student so this is going to bring you to actually you know what i'm so sorry i'm going to back up here i realized that i need to use my sandbox version because i actually don't want to create um an actual student in our system we're going to create a fake one so let's start over we're going to do this in stage um we're going to create new account i'm a student okay now here we're going to fill out some basic information for the student so we're gonna go with spongebob squarepants his email address of course is spongebob dot squarepants um and again here you want to make sure that you're using a personal email address um instead of a school email address because school email addresses often deactivate over the summer next you're going to create a unique password and then next you're going to input your date of birth and the reason why we ask for this is because per our entry guidelines um only students that are 13 years or older can enter to the awards um students that are in seventh grade and not yet 13 will need to wait until they are 13. on or before the end their entry deadline in order to create an account um this is all to say though that they if they are 12 and about to turn 13 soon um they should try to have all of their materials ready to enter once they do turn 13 if they are able to enter by the deadline and they turn 13 by then so next after we're going to choose i plan to enter so you have an option art writing art and writing spongebob is going to enter both art in writing and we're going to choose our grade spongebob is in 12th grade he's a senior um and i'm choosing that because it will be helpful later when we're setting up adding a portfolio so after that you're going to click this green button here for which school you attend but before i do that i want you to also look at this button this checkbox underneath it um if you are a homeschooled student you're going to want to check this box here and the reason why we differentiate here is because students are sorted into their regions based on their school zip codes so obviously if you enter if you attend a school that's not at home um it may be different than your home address and so you want to make sure that you're sorted into the correct region along with the rest of your classmates but for all intents and purposes spongebob he attends a school in tennessee and of course he attends bikini bottom high school and then you'll see here that the school is now populated after this you're gonna check a box here how did you find out about the awards he found out from another student and now we can go ahead and create account so here you're going to be brought to a new landing page um and you're going to see here um two links that lead to your specific regional program web pages um these are the same web pages that we were looking at before under the my region page on artwriting.org so next we can go ahead and move to the next page um this is the scholarships page so here you can review any upcoming excuse me upcoming scholarships for this year um students will have an opportunity to opt in when uploading a work um that is relevant to the scholarship theme or requirement so definitely students check out this page here to see if any of your works are eligible um so now we can actually get started i'm going to click start now and this is going to bring us to our main dashboard so here you'll notice a couple things on the right first and foremost you're going to see your art and writing deadlines these are always going to be seen um front and center right on the top right hand corner so that we always have access to them underneath that you're going to see again links to your regional web pages below that you'll see your school below that you're going to see information about again the featured scholarships and the participation terms you know these are just for reference and just to make sure that you are working within our copyright and plagiarism guidelines so before we actually move ahead with adding a work we're going to want to complete spongebob's profile because it is we've only filled in basic information so far but we still have a little bit more to finish and the reason why we ask for more information it's really just for communication purposes so you know if you are a student who submits work and you receive a regional award um this is information that we can use um to mail out your key um to mail it out to your school or contact you for any other reason um let's say we may give you a call if you receive top honors um so this is just for us to have to be able to reach you um so we'll go ahead and fill in the rest of his um profile information here we go i already have it pre-filled um now you're gonna also fill in phone number your preferred email um we're also gonna select spongebob's pronouns that he goes by you can choose ethnicity and then after you finish this first section here make sure that you click this blue save button here um it's very important that you save all information oh you know what i actually have to fill in new information because this is already used before so i'm gonna make it up [Music] see if that works hmm that is interesting let's see what's going on um [Music] okay so you know what i'm going to do i am going to log into another student right now and try that um i'm just going to go back way if you all don't mind because his information is already completed okay so of course we already have squidward tentacles okay so we have our student here squidward he's also a senior we'll see all of his information is he filled in here um what i was mentioning before is make sure that after each section that you click the blue save button um because each section has its own save function so just make sure that you save all of your information and you don't lose anything um you also want to fill in your parent and guardian information here this is again just another avenue of communication if we need to reach the student for any reason below that we're going to see school again if we click the blue edit button it'll open up we're going to see our school already here he also attends bikini bottom and you'll also notice here other educational program so this is a spot where students can list an after school program a summer program or any other extracurricular program where you may have created your work so when you add an after-school program you can also add educators from that program through this feature um so that we can credit that educator also in any publications or exhibitions if a piece receives an award so we're going to go ahead and click save all right and so now we can return back to our dashboard now that the profile is completed so we're going to ignore the fact that there's works here already we'll come back to that later we're going to want to add a new artwork so oh and before i do that also just want to point out if we scroll down here this is again for seniors any students in 12th grade um you're going to see a button here where you can add an art portfolio and a writing portfolio this will only show up in dashboards for students who are in 12th grade but for now we're just going to add an individual artwork so we're going to click add work here at the top all right and we're just going to fill in some basic information we're going to call this work number nine because i think we already have one through eight on this student um and here what type of work this is you can either choose art or writing just a quick note here um students will always see art or writing unless one of the deadlines passes for one of those regions then it will disappear but the deadline has not passed and squidward wants to submit art and here we're going to choose our category he is going to be entering photography next we're going to move to our school and educator tab so here you're going to see again the school that squidward has already added to his account in this yellow box here you'll also again be able to add your extracurricular program and then below that you're going to see your educator information so we see here that squidward did his work with eugene crabbe so we're going to select him um if you don't see your educator listed here you can also add a new educator using this link here and just make sure you that you have your educators email address because they're going to be received receiving a notification to create an account um and then that way they can connect to your account um through our system next we're going to go to copyright and plagiarism policy so here students just need to agree that they read and understood our copyright and plagiarism guide we do encourage all students to thoroughly look through this guide to make sure that they have a clear understanding that the work that they are entering is eligible um or if it's in violation of our guidelines we do review each piece carefully to make sure it's in accordance with the guidelines um and we will remove any awards that are in violation so squidward has read the guide agrees checks it and now we can move on to actually uploading our work so we're to kind of just run down the line here with a couple questions what source did you use to create the work squidward made it up completely from his own observation idea and imagination next we're going to enter the dimensions of the work i'll just make up a number here what material did you use to create the work squidward you use adobe photoshop for his photography and then um we're gonna add a tag for our work um and you just we use tags um just sort of for us um you know if your work does um receive a regional or national award um and we wanna feature your work in an exhibition or a blog post or anything like that we can search works um based on a certain theme or type and we can easily find them through tags and then next we can actually go ahead and upload our work so what we're going to do is click this blue button here upload file and we have some dummy works already set up here which i will choose um again make sure that you're using one of the formats listed here i'm using a jpeg and something important to note here is when you're uploading image you want to make sure that it's high quality we do hear a lot of feedback from jurors that high quality images are very helpful to have when judging and you can tell on the the quality of your image by this line here for print quality you can see here that this one is good which is good um you may see if it does say poor or if it's in red um red text you may just want to consider re-uploading the work with a better quality image that way again you are giving judges the best opportunity to judge your work and hopefully receive an award so next we're going to go to our featured scholarships and here this is the place where students can actually go ahead and opt into any of these scholarship awards so you can click the links here and get a little bit more of a description about the scholarship and click the check box um to opt in um so as i mentioned before each award is tied to a theme or specific organization that students need to be a part of in order to participate and then also scholarships require a written statement about why they're entering the piece for that particular scholarship um we do make sure make sure that students read through all of the scholarships again um to see if any of the works are eligible and also i just want to point out that it really isn't that much work to opt into a scholarship um it really is just 50 words and checking a box so we really do encourage all students to do it if the work is eligible for that scholarship okay but squidward for all intents and purposes he's not going to submit to a scholarship so we're just going to go ahead next and review so i want to point out here um something at the top right here so depending on your region you may see this section um about how you plan to send in your submission form you can either select by digital upload or by mailing it along with uh your payment um again it's important to note this because depending on your choice um which i will show later um your payment option will need to match it um either digital or by mail and again we'll come back to that and show um how to do both um and then after that um just make sure that you skim through all the information here to make sure that it's all accurate um award certificates that students receive will have information spelled out exactly as it's here in their account on this review page um so just please make sure that everything is correct in terms of spelling capitalization etc okay so now that we've reviewed our work and everything looks good next we're going to move on to our submission form so you have the option of either to print the form or download so for squidward we're going to go ahead and download so that way we can take a look at the form together so we'll open it here okay so here you can see that every entry form is going to consist of the same information student information here instructions on how to enter to this particular regional program information about the work here which includes a unique barcode for the work and then when we scroll down you'll see lines at the bottom for student and parent guardian signature as i mentioned before no educator signatures are required this year but we do still strongly encourage educators to review student works just to make sure that they are the best versions they can be and to make sure that they are original works and that they follow our copyright and plagiarism guidelines so we're going to pretend that this form has been signed and completed one moment all right so again we're going to pretend that the form was completed so now we're going to come back to our dashboard here and we're going to click upload submission form then you're going to select this button here choose file and we're going to select our entry form of course this is the dummy one but you would have a completed one then you have to make sure that you click the green upload form button this actually performs the action of uploading it to your dashboard um so definitely make sure that you click that button so now that your submission form is uploaded for this work we can move on to payment alrighty so depending on your region again students may have the option to either pay digitally via paypal or by mailing a check so if students find payment to be a barrier to participation again they can also elect to complete a fee waiver to participate and i'm gonna walk through um all three options um here so first um we're gonna go through the steps of paying by paypal so what you're gonna do is check the box next to the work again notice in this status box it says digital because uh well you know what let me scroll down to work number nine the one we actually just entered well you see here that it's digital and this is because again during in the review page we selected that we were going to digitally upload uh the submission form so we're gonna check the box here and then we're gonna click pay by paypal this is going to bring you out to uh the paypal page um and then this is where you'll complete your seven dollar entry fee payment um something to note is that you don't need a paypal account um if you do that's great but if you don't you can also select this button here to pay with debit or credit card and check out as a guest um so again we're going to pretend that we went through the process of paying for the work and so if we go back out back to our dashboard we'll see here that the status has changed um of course since i didn't complete the payment it says incomplete but if you did complete it correctly it will have a check and say paid by paypal and then so you're all good with your payment there okay so we're going to reset the status and now we're going to go through the option as if you were paying by check so let's say we want to pay by check for this work i check the box you'll notice that i don't have the option here to click pay by check and again that's because for our uh submission form we selected that we're going to upload it digitally and so the form and the payment do need to match so what we can do is if we do want to pay this um by check we're going to go back out to our dashboard we're going to find our work work number nine and we're going to click this blue button here edit and this is going to bring us right back to our review page where we last left off and so now at the top instead of uploading the form we're going to select the box that says to mail it so when we do that when we scroll down you'll notice that the text here changed for what it previously previously was to submission form is going to be sent by mail so we're going to pretend again that we print the form download it get it signed and then we are going to mail this form along with your check again this is completely dependent on your region not all students have this option but if you do belong in a region where you have this option this is how you do it so we're going to save and return to dashboard and now if we scroll back down to all of our um our payment screen for all of our works we'll see for work number nine the status here has changed to by mail instead of digital and so now if we select the box we do have the option to pay by check so we can go ahead and select that and this pop-up box here it just provides instructions on next steps on how to um actually pay by check and that whole process along with your submission form so we'll just click ok and we'll see here that payment by check has been selected and then again just make sure that you actually mail your uh payment in forms in order for the um entry to be judged the last payment option that we're going to go through i'm going to reset the status again here is the fee waiver again fee waivers are for any students who um are unable to enter the awards because the payment poses a barrier um that they can't um participate so to select fee waiver you're just going to scroll down to the bottom here pass art and writing region sections and you're going to select this check box here is the submission fee a barrier to your participation yes i'm just going gonna read this little blurb here and then you're gonna click this green confirm button so this is going to bring you to this new screen here where you'll now have the option to either print or download the fee waiver form for squidward we're going to go ahead and download the form and we'll take a look at what the fee waiver looks like here okay so in the same way that students would complete the entry form students will download the feed waiver form and you will need to review um the terms and also get a parent or guardian signature again at the bottom students do not need to provide any additional financial information in order to be eligible to complete a fee waiver all that needs to happen is that the parent or parent or guardian signs off and then once you do that you're going to re-upload the signed fee waiver form to your accounts the same way that you do for the entry forms something to note also is that entry forms are unique to every single individual works entered so students will have a different entry form for every work that they're entering but students only need to complete one fee waiver form and that will cover all of the works entered so again we're gonna pretend that squidward got his fee waiver form signed by him and his parent or guardian we're going to come back to our fee waiver screen here and then you're going to see underneath where we downloaded another green button here you're going to upload your signed fee waiver form i'm going gonna click that and just like the entry form we're gonna choose our file we have our dummy fee we've reformed here and again make sure that you click the green upload form button for the action to actually happen and to have it actually upload to your dashboard and now you are all set to go so now we can return back to the dashboard and if we scroll through our works now i didn't mention this quite before but i'll mention it now this is where you see the status of all of your works so if we scroll back down to work number nine we'll see that the work has been uploaded submission form has been printed fee waiver form has been completed and uploaded and submission status you're submitted you're finished um some questions that we get from students is why the text here is yellow and not green um this is because um so these steps are technically finished from the student end so if it's yellow that's great it's really just a pending notification for our team during the judging process to make sure that we actually review that we received your entry form um and your fee waiver form and your payment um if we do um then this will be updated and all the text will turn to green so again when you're uploading a work at the end of the day you want to make sure that all of the text is green or yellow if you see any red that means a portion of it is not complete yet and you should go back um through the um entry process and see what's missing um and and correct it before your deadline so that is the steps of uploading an individual entry so now we're gonna jump into really briefly um this is again for seniors um anyone who's in 12th grade how to actually upload a portfolio because we often get questions from students about this too it is generally the same but it is also different so first if we are going to be adding a new portfolio we're going to click add our portfolio here um before i even do that i also want to mention before you can even add a portfolio you need to make sure that you've already uploaded your in your works as individual entries that way when you get this box here for the portfolio they actually populate under here under eligible works so what you're going to do first is obviously add a name to your portfolio we'll call it portfolio number three because i think we already have two others in there next you're going to choose again how you want to complete your entry form either digital or by mail we'll go with digital and then we're just going to drag our six works into the boxes here to add them to our portfolio all right also just want to point out here portfolios do not need to have works that are only from one category um so while squidward here only has photography works um you could also add other artworks not writing works but other artworks that fall under different categories and also include them in your portfolio this also applies to writing portfolios where a writing portfolio can consist of poetry and a dramatic script and other works that fall under different writing categories okay so next now that we've added our six works we can scroll down and we're gonna be choosing our educators you can again choose up to three educators but for squidward he has one educator it's eugene krabs we're going with that now when we scroll down again i mentioned this earlier just repeating once more if you are entering a portfolio seniors do need to submit two statements um an artist or writer statement and a personal statement each statement must not exceed 500 words um and the artist statement here um this is just a way for you to provide insight into the themes or processes used to create the portfolio and this is viewable by jurors um during the judging process the personal statement above here um this is just going to be you know quick short story from your life um where you're describing an experience that either demonstrates your character or helped shape it um this statement is not available for viewing by jurors um but it may be viewed by a scholarship committee should your portfolio advance to the national level rounding of judging okay so we're just going to add in test test test fake personal artist and personal statements and then after that we're just going to click the save and close button and click close pop-up and after that our portfolio is now uploaded and again you'll see the status here all the works have been uploaded um again you do need to upload a um submission form for each piece of work that you upload so that that means there is a difference um you do need to upload an entry form for all of your individual works and also another one for your portfolio as a full piece so we'll just again pretend we have our completed entry form upload form return to our dashboard and we will see that we're all set so that is the process um the entry process for uploading works um and submitting to the scholastic awards so before i hop back over to our other presentation again does anyone have any questions about the entry process i'm sure they're going to be questions so again please feel free to drop them into the q a box or and we'll also hold them for the q a session at the end all righty so let me hop back over to our presentation all right so again just before we hop off here um i just want to share with you a reminder of some of the important upcoming dates and deadlines um and this applies to anyone who's entering the awards first i want to point out of course again entry deadlines they do vary by region um but they do start um on december 1st um again which is right around the corner so we do highly suggest that you finalize entries before your deadline when you check in your account especially since because our system is often overloaded with entries around the deadline period um after that point once we get the works and the students works are in our hands we begin processing them and then we'll be getting back in touch with students after judging has completed next like entry deadlines regional award notifications vary by region but all students will be able to see if they received an award in their accounts no later than january 28th all students who receive our top regional award the gold key are automatically considered um for national awards and they will be notified if they receive a national silver medal a gold medal or direct scholarship on march 17th and last but not least students who receive a gold medal at the national level or a direct scholarship are invited to join us for a celebration ceremony here in new york city on june 9th which again as i mentioned earlier it may be a virtual event this year that is still to be determined and we will let all educators and students know um all of those updates all righty to wrap up here um i just want to thank you all again so so much for joining us here today um please visit these resources here on this page for more information about the program and please always feel free to uh email us at rel art in writing dot org with any questions um i also want to point out here the last bullet we've also created a new series of step-by-step videos to help students and educators create and navigate their accounts and we can also drop the links for those in the chat as well and lastly again i will be sending out a copy of this webinar as well for your review um we'll be sending a video version and also a pdf of the slide so that way you can access the clickable links in the presentation all righty and so before we hop up in a couple of minutes um please do feel free to take this time to type any questions in the q a box um otherwise um you know you can email us again um and we'll be hosting a short uh q a session now um so thank you all so much again for joining us today um it really has been a pleasure going through this process with you hey danny we have a few questions already queued up in the q a very great first up we got a lot of questions about if students need to list an educator on their work even if they did not create the work with an educator and who counts as an educator that is a great question so sorry let me just hop back over to my other screen okay so in short um students technically do not need to listen to educator and this is because um sorry let me be more specific um educators do not need to create an account um for students to be able to enter their works however students do need to still list a quote-unquote educator that doesn't necessarily mean that it has to be your actual teacher um in school um it could be a trusted adult um a guidance counselor um anyone that is sort of um you know a leader figure um or anyone that really could um help support you through the entry process because granted there are a couple steps involved um and students often need help and so it's just a way um for students to sort of get that extra help and also reminders about deadlines um but it is by no means uh required for students to add educators um yeah it's not like their work won't get judged if they don't add an educator um sorry katie what was the second part of that question um i think you answered it so every work does need an educator but it doesn't have to be a school educator and specifically we got a question can an educator be a parent uh yes uh it could be if you don't have you know an educator in your school who um can uh you know connect to your account um it could be a parent or guardian thanks manny and kind of connected to that can you talk a little bit about if you created the work with a like a summer camp or an after school program or a private tutoring program outside of school do you still need to list your day school when you create your account uh that is a good question um and yes you do um because again you are assigned to your um region based on your school zip code so that could be again if you're homeschooled you can do it through there or just add your day school but that doesn't mean that when you enter your work you can still add that after school program and choose the educator from that after school program to be connected to that work um if it helps i can also walk through that process so let me do that so we're gonna go back to squidward and we're gonna edit his profile um and we're gonna go to school and we'll go here to change to other educational program um okay so let's say we click here let's say it's in tennessee let's see i'm not sure what just happened that is interesting um but yeah um i hope that answers the question um yeah i think that that does okay sorry the system being a little funky thank you we have a couple more questions we got a lot of questions about are there themes or prompts uh that is a good question as well um so there are no specific themes or prompts um that you need to abide by to enter the awards um the only um guidelines when it comes to themes is again if you are applying to a specific scholarship a specific direct scholarship opportunity um so some examples of this um we have the one earth award and the one earth award is you know about climate change on the environment so in that sense if you want to apply to that specific scholarship your work should tie into that theme in some way um if you don't plan on submitting to any of the scholarships by no means do you have to match a certain theme um [Music] a caveat to this um again this is for seniors only who are handling portfolios while you don't necessarily need a theme in order to enter your portfolio it does help to have a sort of thematic thread to the pieces in your portfolio um you know it's just an added um artistic merit to your work when it goes through through the judging process because again we want to think about the three main criteria that judges are looking at which is originality technical skill and emergence of a personal voice or vision so if you have a certain theme that your works can be connected by and if that really ties into and amplifies one of those criteria um that's that could only be a plus great thank you manny and um jumping off of that we had a lot of questions about what the judging criteria personal voice or vision means that's a good question um so it's pretty similar to the concept of originality um again we want to think about you know how many students out there have artworks um that are going to be entering the contest you know you want to think about what makes your work stand out among the rest um and what works sort of speaks to your personal experience um something that you feel is really strongly and passionate about you want to make sure that that comes through in your work and similar to that uh we had a question about what what the criteria are for the american voices and visions awards oh that's a good question um you know what katie i the thought is slipping my mind right now um i am happy to jump in yeah or yeah i was going to say also drop in the link i'm in the chat box as well yeah but katie yeah could do you mind jumping in for this one no no no no thanks buddy um if you don't mind finding the link that would be great the american voices and visions awards are kind of like a um best in show for each region so every region has five american voices or visions nominees the voices nominees are from writing regions and the visions nominees are from art regions and the folks nominated for those regions are considered for the national american voices or visions awards and again there are no specific criteria for that each region will judge these a little bit differently but it's really just judges looking at a host of some of their top achieving works the favorite works that came out of that day and just thinking about what's really representative of their region all works are considered for the american voices and visions awards there is nothing additional that you need to do in the entry process thank you katie we had another question a few questions can 2020 can works created in april may or june of this year or even in the previous school year be entered in this scholastic awards year um yes they can be um you just want to make sure that it's not a work that has received an award before but you can certainly enter a work um from 2020. oh excuse me also to clarify um for portfolios katie that's correct right it's for portfolios you may submit it um yeah for all yeah for all works you can enter works that were created in the previous school year so long as they were not entered in the scholastic awards before but as you said manny if you entered a piece in the awards before as a senior and you want to include that piece in your portfolio you can do so but you cannot enter it as an individual piece as well it can only be entered as part of your portfolio if it was entered in the awards in a previous year yes that's correct springboarding off of that um i see some questions about uploading uploading artworks um do you have any recommendations or places where people can find guidelines on how best to take photos of their artwork physical artwork that needs to be uploaded so for example what's the process for uploading a sculpture that is a great question and you know i would actually direct them to check out the categories page which i'm trying to find right now um so i can just say right off the bat that if you do have let's say like a physical piece of work like a uh sculpture um a 3d work um you will need to take a photograph of that work um and we definitely recommend that it has you know really good lighting um make sure that it's a very simple uh background not distracting in any way you really want all the focus to be on the artwork itself um and then you'll just upload that high quality photo of the work as we did with photography um you also have the choice for certain categories such as um you know ceramics and glass or sculpture where it does have a 3d aspect to it you can submit um multiple photos for that single work that showcases different angles of that work and so you can upload all of those photos as part of that single work great thanks manny and we got a lot of questions about if there's any limit to the number of works that can be entered in the awards that is also a great question um so on the for the most part there are no restrictions on how many artwork uh art or writing works that you can enter um the only exceptions are with portfolios you can only upload up to two writing and two art portfolios and for photography you can only upload up to 16 individual works but besides that there aren't really any restrictions on how many works you can upload any other questions let's see here um we've gotten a number of questions about can you use um artwork found online for inspiration for your piece if you say draw it yourself or recreate it yourself that's a good question so first and foremost um i would say check the copyright and plagiarism guide um sort of all the instructions are laid out there uh for this specific instance um you're sort of playing a dangerous game because works that basically copy another work that you found online would be a form of plagiarism um the only difference if if you find a work online but you radically transform it where it's really something that's wholly unique and original but you use it as a piece of inspiration that's okay um but if it is copied too much um it may likely get flagged during the judging process and may not move forward we also received some questions about seventh graders who are currently 12 are they able to enter the award unfortunately they are not able to enter um this is just again for according to our participation guidelines students must be 13 by the time of their entry deadline um you know if if they turn 13 um the day before or day of they are eligible they'll just have to make sure that they enter their have all of their work ready for uploading um by the time of their deadline um but if they are 12 past on or past their deadline excuse me pass their deadline they will not be able to enter um but you know also we need to remember that um you know 12 uh kids that are in seventh grade and are 12 they still have about was that four or five more years um opportunity to enter to the awards so we definitely recommend um any 12 year olds to you know still keep at it continue working on your art um and consider applying for the next for next year we got a question about our judges with regard to the artists and writers who are invited to serve as judges what is scholastic the scholastic awards is commitment to diversity wait sorry could you repeat the question yes uh with regards to the artists and writers who are invited to serve as judges what are the scholastic awards is what is the scholastic words commitment to diversity that is a great question um it is something that we really strive for and commit to fully um are we really pride ourselves on making sure that our jurors come from a diverse um selection of people um so not only again are diverse in terms of like art or writing or the kind of profession that they are in um but definitely you know taking their background into consideration um gender all of these um aspects um that provide a more full judging experience um yeah we we definitely take that into full consideration um when we're recruiting our jurors each year and we received a couple of questions about the benefits of uploading a senior portfolio compared to individual pieces the benefits of uploading a portfolio that's an interesting question um i mean it definitely depends on you know i think if you that's a really good question um i mean it really depends on the student um i think that in terms of benefit i mean for one um it is something exclusive only to seniors i mean if you know if you do have um you know six works that you feel can add and enter into a portfolio you do have um the portfolio awards which are specific for that um and that is one of our highest honors to get um gold medal portfolio award um so if that's something you're striving for um please go for it um we have seen so many i even think about last year um all of the portfolios received gold medal portfolios and they just uh blew us away so yeah i would say definitely you have the portfolio award which is very unique just for that um so if you have a portfolio we definitely recommend that you enter it you got a question what are the benefits of doing this program that is a great question also um i mean you know it really comes down to you know pride i think in your work and in yourself um yes you get awards um you know this and that um but ultimately i feel like we find that students it's sort of a validation that for the work that they're doing um is being seen um and again like this is just going back to you know our jurors who really are coming from all different kinds of backgrounds um all different perspectives and so to be recognized um by so many diverse people and they're all agreeing that you know your work um means something and it really um touched them um and then you know it you know it could be exhibited um it could be published like these are things that can reach people um so that is one benefit to it um you know you we also have of course you know the um scholarships offer you know also financial assistance um for college um and some scholarships also um you know you have an opportunity to attend like um oh i can't think of the word right now um like an art or writing uh getaway i can't think of the word right now um but you know um this is i guess specifically for educators um you know if your student wins um you know um i believe it's a gold medal um you have a chance to attend um a sort of artistic retreat is the word i was looking for um an art or writing retreat so that's another benefit um yeah i just think that um you know if you're interested in the awards you should definitely consider playing because there are a lot of benefits i think i think we have time for one more question um before we do that if we were not able to get to your questions today please be sure to email us at we'll put it in here you can we encourage you first to check out our faq right here and if you have a specific question about your account you can email us at ral at artandwriting.org um and let's see some outstanding questions that we seem to have a lot of what is the difference between key awards and medals key awards and medals you said so the scholastic awards operates on two different levels essentially um two uh levels of judging so when you enter your work it first is judged on a regional level um so there isn't really a tried and true method for what your region constitutes it could be you know um the northeast of the us let's say or it may just be your state um again this all depends on when you create your account and um enter your school zip code and you're assigned to a region um whatever region that that is you would get a um if your work advances um and you receive an honorable mention silver key or gold key those are specifically regional awards for any student that receives a gold key at the regional level moves on to the next level of judging and that's on the national scale um so for on the national scale um you know you can receive a silver medal or a gold medal um so that's sort of just a language distinction that we have in the awards um there is a difference between a gold key let's say and a gold medal gold medal being national level gold key being regional level so um i i think that's all the time we have for now is that right okay so again thank you all so so much um if you're still with us now um thank you so much for joining us and we really hope that this was um helpful helpful for you um and we really look forward to seeing the works that you create this year um and again this webinar is being recorded so if there's anything that you feel like you missed don't worry we will be sending it via email um and again please feel free to email us at rel artwriting.org and we'll be able to answer any of your questions there as well so thank you so so much