How to Prepare for the SWAP
The Scholastic Writing Awards Program invites students to share their writing and experiences with other students and instructors at a half-day conference in December, but the process begins months before that. Here's how the whole process works:
REGISTER
By the October 10 deadline, complete and mail the registration form to John Heyda: .pdf | .doc
WRITE
We'll notify you that we've received your registration, and your team can begin work on its individual and collaborative essays. The complete instructions on how to write and submit the team's writing are in "instructions1". The deadline for submitting this work is November 10, 2008.
READ
We'll notify you that we've received your team's writing packet, and we'll forward an electronic copy of your team's writing packet to a student team at another school in the region. We'll email you with information about your partner school, provide you with electronic copies of your partner school's team's writing packet, and instructions on what to do with your partner team's writing. At this time, we'l also need to know what kind of creative writing workshop the team members prefer—fiction or poetry. The complete instructions on how to prepare for the conference are in "instructions2."
ATTEND THE CONFERENCE
Meet your partner team for some face to face interaction, get to know other student-writers and instructors, take a creative writing workshop, attend a seminar on teaching writing, enjoy lunch with live student readings, awards, and of course, your team's copy of Student Voices, with highlights from all the participants' writing submissions.
Registration Form and Preperation Information
Registration form: .pdf | .doc
Instructions 1: on writing and submitting your team's work .doc | .pdf
Instructions 2: on reading your partner team's work and getting ready for the conference .doc | .pdf