SARANAC LAKE — The Adirondack Daily Enterprise and Lake Placid News are sponsoring a Biography/Personal Profile writing contest for local students in grades 4 through 12. Each profile must be written about a living person.

The contest is open to students in the newspapers’ readership area — those who are homeschooled or who attend the following districts and schools: AuSable Valley Central, Keene Central, Lake Placid Central, Saranac Lake Central, Tupper Lake Central, North Country School, Northwood School and St. Bernard’s School.

“This new contest is part of the newspapers’ Next Generation Newsroom, which we launched in 2023 to create educational pathways for local students to become professional journalists,” Editor/Publisher Andy Flynn said.

The prizes are:

– Elementary School (grades 4-5): First, $100; second, $75; third, $50

– Middle School (grades 6-8): First, $200; second, $150; third, $100

– High School (grades 9-12): First, $300; second, $225; third, $150

“We chose the Biography/Personal Profile because these are types of feature stories we print in the News and Enterprise on a regular basis,” Flynn said. “We like to celebrate the people of our community, and the personal profile is a great way to tell stories about interesting residents in the Tri-Lakes region.”

Stories will be judged on interest, writing style, punctuation, capitalization, grammar and storytelling technique. Writers must interview the story subject (in person or by phone).

Interviews can be supported by research from news stories and primary source material such as letters, etc. to help students write the stories. Photos of the subjects can be taken by the writer or supplied.

Stories written partially or wholly with AI-generated content will be considered plagiarism and will be disqualified.

All submissions must be emailed to Editor/Publisher Andy Flynn at aflynn@lakeplacidnews.com.

The following are the submission guidelines for the writing contest:

– Attach the essay to the email as a Word document or PDF.

– Title the email: “2024 Spring Writing Contest Submission: [writer’s name]”.

– Essays should be double spaced, in Times New Roman, 12pt font.

– Elementary school submissions must be between 500 and 700 words.

– Middle school submissions must be between 700 and 900 words.

– High school submissions must be between 800 and 1,000 words.

– Each Biography/Personal Profile should include a headline; writer’s name, grade, school; teacher’s name; and teacher’s contact information (phone and email).

– Each email should include 1-2 photos of the person being profiled. Attach the photos as a jpeg (at least 1 MB in size). Do not embed the photo inside the Word document.

The submission deadline is 5 p.m. Friday, March 29. Judging will take place in April, a celebration reading will be held in May (date and venue TBD) and winning entries will be published in both newspapers.

The Enterprise covers the Tri-Lakes villages of Lake Placid, Saranac Lake and Tupper Lake and the towns of Brighton, Franklin, Harrietstown, Jay, Keene, North Elba, Piercefield, St. Armand, Santa Clara, Tupper Lake and Wilmington. The News covers the village of Lake Placid and the towns of Jay, Keene, North Elba and Wilmington.