About 2017 Challenge Future Essay Competition
Application is currently ongoing for the 2017 Challenge Future Essay Competition.
Giving a quick analysis on world’s headlines and news today, you will see that a large portion of them, if not more than 70% speak about something bad that has happened in some country. It’s not anymore the question “What shocked you during last month?”, moreover, it’s “What shocked you today?”
If you are Turkish, was it something that happened on the border with Syria, or latest car bomb in Istanbul? Possibly, the same news have shocked somebody cross-borders.
If you were from Poland or Belarus, was it that government starts logging in Bialowieza Forest, the last remaining European primeval forest?
Did you maybe find it uncanny that by 2050, some say that we will have sex with robots?
The headline could be anything!
Moreover, connect with your personal experiences. Your peer future-challenger who lives in Istanbul, was only minutes away when a bomb exploded in the city center. Another one was close to the place where a bomb exploded in Brussels. A third one who grew nearby the Bialowieza Forest will have all his childhood memories wiped out once the forest is destroyed.
We consume these types of headlines that shake the world on a daily basis. So much so, many of us have become immune – does it shock us anymore? How do we respond to such news?
If we were to build a counter-narrative of responds to these type of news, how would a narrative of that kind look like? Well, that would be our challenge here!
Timeline
- Challenge opens: 10 November
- Community votes: 1 December – 15 January, 2017
- Challenge closes: 15 January, 2017
- Judges votes: 15 January – 20 January 2017
- Announcement of winners – 21 January 2017
Prizes
For the first time as a community we employ a new kind of reward system. On this challenge, it will be the challenge:Future Virtual Marketplace that will assure the rewards for all winners of the challenge.
As previously announced, the C:F Judges, will reward the best competitors with unique creative goodies/ crafts & you’re gonna love these gifts!
Your Tasks
- Pick the headline. What are the news about? Re-read it. What message you can extract from the post? Does it affect you personally? Were you there and saw it happening?
- Open the “Post idea” button (on your upper-right of this page). Choose category for the news you have picked (for example: environment distortion news, hate speech related news, news on terrorism activities, news on climate change effects – you name it). Along with writing suitable category for your news, copy a link / source of these news.
- Re-write it. Decode it. Answer it! Bellow the headline and the link that you have copied, give your personal and creative respond to the news. Your task now is to convert the message of the news and make one which you would rather have read. Make it a positive counter-message – the counter-news. This is about how you re-imagine what sort of news you wish to read today!
Tip
- –The possibilities for you are open. As you have the freedom to choose from a pool of information you wish to convert, still pay attention to their nature. Make sure that the information you use and “reply to” within your submission is valid. If it is about climate change, then it must be scientifically valid. If it is about extremism, that it is well reported and from trusted source, so on and so forth.
- – Close reading of the message will help you classify it. The news message can have variety of purposes like any other text – for example (1) simply spreading hatred on the internet, (2) is it violating your culture, (3) is it a misinterpretation, (4) is it about brainwashing, and does it serve to nurture some type of fanaticism.
- –You are free to select a portion of the text in the news that you will re-write. As long as provide link to full news you are good to go (and as long as your “re-write” serves as a positive counter-message)
- –You can also select news from your local language. In that case, do provide the link, but also before you write your respond (counter-message), please make sure that the local news is translated in English.
- –Don’t limit yourself while re-imagining global news!
Evaluation Criteria
Judges will take in account the following criteria:
- Quality of arguments: While you re-write the global news, we will be looking for your solid arguments. Your writing should display creativity, logic and true argumentation. It should resonate with positivity and a good vibration. How witty? How smart? How humorous your answer is? (40% of points)
- Educational component: Is your message educational? Can it be really published as an example at world-known magazines and newsrooms? What good example do you embrace with your message that can be good for young people around the world? (40%)
- Creativity of your answer and how well do you play with your imagination will be of additional value to your submission (20%)
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