Westmeath County Council, as part of its Decade of Centenaries programme, invites entries to a new essay competition open to all senior cycle students. The deadline for entries is 5pm on Thursday 3 November and the competition criteria are as follows:
Westmeath during the War of Independence (1919-1921) and/or Civil War (1922-1923). Contributors are asked to write about any aspect of that period in Westmeath's history. Contributors may concentrate on a particular person, group, organisation, place or event related to the county's history during those years. Apart from political and military topics, contributions on cultural, social and sporting topics are welcome.
A book token to the value of €200 will be awarded to the winner of First Place. The Second Place entry will receive a book token to the value of €150 and the Third Place entry will receive a book token to the value of €100.
The First Place essay will - subject to meeting the requisite quality standards - be published in the Westmeath Independent, Westmeath Examiner and on Westmeath County Council's Decade of Centenaries blog - http://www.westmeathcoco.ie/decadeofcentenaries. Westmeath County Council reserves the right to publish selected entries on their website.
Essays are to be a minimum of 1,000 words and a maximum of 1,100 words. Essays outside that range will be ineligible.
Contributors must include, at the bottom of each essay, a brief list of sources relevant to their essay. This list will not form part of the essay word count.
Entries must be submitted as a Word document. File formats such as PowerPoint and PDF will not be accepted. Images will not be accepted.
Open to all senior cycle students. Only one entry is allowed per student.
5pm, Thursday 3 November.
Entries must be submitted by email to historian@westmeathcoco.ie as a single Word document. As noted above, file formats such as PowerPoint and PDF will not be accepted. Images will not be accepted.
All entries will be assessed against the competition criteria by a panel of adjudicators. The panel's verdict is final and no correspondence shall be entered into regarding individual competition entries. The competition results will be announced to the public on 25 November 2022. Only competition winners will be individually notified.
Content Last Updated/Reviewed: 21/09/2022