Essay Contest 2008-2009

We pleased to announce this year's student Cal Poly Philosophy Essay Contest. The winner of the contest will receive a prize of $500. The Philosophy Department wishes to thank Prof. Linda Bomstad, Mr. John Conte, Mr. Marcus Sandoval, and The Schering-Plough Corporation for their generous support of this contest.

Philosophy Essay Contest Rules

Download nomination form (.pdf)

1. 1. Essays are to be nominated by faculty in the Cal Poly Philosophy Department. Essays may be on any topic and will typically originate as term papers in courses offered by the department. Faculty may nominate as many essays as they wish. Students may seek nominations from faculty who have read their papers. As part of the nomination process, nominating faculty will submit an Essay Contest Nomination form electronically to the Philosophy Department’s ASC. The Faculty Essay Contest Nomination Form is available on the Philosophy Department’s web site (www.cla.calpoly.edu/phil).
2. 2. Nominated essays should be between 7 and 20 typed pages in length (between 2,100 and 6,000 words), and double-spaced with normal margins, printed in a standard font (e.g., Times New Roman 12 point, etc.). In addition, essays must observe proper citation conventions (e.g., MLA Stylesheet, APA, Chicago Manual of Style, etc.); plagiarism will not be tolerated and will result in a report to the offending student's college dean.
3. 3. Essays need not be identical with the draft originally submitted for course credit; indeed, it is expected that faculty will advise authors of nominated essays on how they might revise and improve their manuscripts for submission to the contest.
4. 4. Students whose essays are considered for the contest must be currently enrolled undergraduates at Cal Poly with a minimum of 6 units; students in any major may participate.
5. 5. Hard copies of essays must be submitted to the Philosophy Department by 4:00 p.m. on Wednesday, May 20, 2009. We regret that we cannot, at this time, accept electronic submissions.
6. 6. Essays should be submitted for blind review in a full-size manila envelope with the words "Philosophy Essay Contest" written on the front, and with the student's name and e-mail address appearing on a detached title page. The student's name should not appear anywhere else in the essay manuscript, the first page of which should begin with the essay's title. The Philosophy Department’s ASC will assign numbers to each essay received, writing the number on the first page of the essay itself above the title, and also on the detached title page with the student's name; title pages with students' names and numbers will be separated from the essays they identify and filed together.
7. 7. Essays without identifying title pages will be judged by a committee of three full-time Philosophy Department faculty members (the Essay Contest Committee).
8. 8. In extraordinary circumstances, the Essay Contest Committee reserves the right not to award a prize or, in the event of a tie, to split the award between two essays.
9. 9. The amount of this year’s prize money is $500.00.
10. 10. The winner(s) will be invited to present the paper at the Philosophy Department’s Spring Philosophy Colloquium. The winner(s) will be notified via e-mail by Tuesday, May 26, 2009.
11. 11. Essays will be available to be picked up by their authors after the Philosophy Department’s Spring Colloquium in the Philosophy Department office.