Do you like to write fiction, poetry, personal essays, or short plays or screenplays? Do you want to share your work with a larger audience? Then Moraine Valley’s literary competition may be perfect for you.

The competition is accepting students’ submissions in the above categories until Oct. 11. Keep in mind that your work must have been produced for a course at Moraine Valley in fall 2022, spring 2023, summer 2023, or fall 2023.

Moraine Valley’s competition is a gateway to compete at the conference level and even the international level. 

The competition is coordinated by MV communications professor Lisa Couch, who does it to promote the value of writing. “I get involved because I love that moment when a student realizes that they’re a writer,” she says.

“I think a lot of times, people tell themselves that they can’t write, and I believe it’s important that people know that they have a voice, and this competition and festival is a way to celebrate the power of people’s voices. It encourages students to see themselves as writers.”

The works will be judged by a panel of professors, and the winners will be announced one week after the deadline. The top three in each category will be recognized during a meeting of the Moraine Valley board of trustees next spring and have their works published in an arts and literature anthology. 

Meanwhile, the top five in all categories advance to the Skyway Conference level and compete against students from other colleges, where the entries will be judged by published authors.

This year, Moraine Valley, which is one of eight colleges in the conference, is hosting the Skyway Writers Conference Competition & Festival. The event takes place Nov. 9 in the F building. Registration begins at 12:30 p.m., followed by lunch and an open mic for performances and readings.

The rest of the afternoon will feature workshops on the four different writing categories, led by the authors who judge the submissions. The festival concludes with a dessert reception beginning at 5 p.m., with a keynote speaker and awards.

Any Moraine Valley student is welcome to attend the festival, regardless of whether they enter the competition.

The keynote speaker is Jennifer Rumberger, a playwright based in Chicago and New York.  Her play The Locusts premiered in October with The Gift Theater Company in Chicago.  Other recent productions include Night in Alachua County with Wildclaw Theatre in Chicago and Open Blue Sky at Stella Adler/NYU Tisch School of the Arts.  

Rumberger is an adjunct professor at Northwestern University and performs her nonfiction essays at live storytelling events around Chicago. 

The first-place winners in each category of Moraine Valley’s contest will advance to compete at the international level through a competition sponsored by the League for Innovation in the Community College. Winners of that competition receive cash prizes and are published in an anthology distributed to all of the colleges in the League.

It all starts with submitting to Moraine Valley’s literary competition. Submissions must meet word or line count restrictions: 3,500 words for fiction, 3,500 words for one-act plays/screenplays, 67 lines for poetry, and 2,500 words for personal essays. 

This year, submissions will also be considered for publication in Velocity. Student editors will determine what is published.

Further submission guidelines can be found on the entry form. Students can also ask questions of their communications instructors or contact Lisa Couch at CouchL3@morainevalley.edu.