HeartTEC Submission Guidelines

American, Israeli, and Palestinian teenagers, 13-19 years old, are invited to submit short essays in English, Hebrew or Arabic on the topic: What would you most like to improve about your own society and how would you do it? Authors of winning essays will receive $500.

What You Need to Know:

Essays must be submitted by September 1, 2022, at 1:00 pm EST/8:00 pm Jerusalem Time.

A group of 12 teen judges – evenly divided between the three societies – will select the winning essays.

Essays will be judged on five criteria: passion, eloquence, pathos, idealism, practicality.

Essays should be original, previously unpublished, and no more than 450 words.

Essays should be authored by a single individual and submitted on this page in PDF or Microsoft Word (doc/docx) format.

Writing and editing workshops will be offered online at no charge for those interested and with no obligation to submit an essay.

In submitting an essay, you agree to the following:

Winning essays will be published with the author’s name - or a suitable alias where an author indicates a preference to remain anonymous - in The Jerusalem Post, Al-Quds, and Christian Science Monitor, as well as in a monograph widely distributed by Heart of a Nation.

Winning essays may appear online in English, Hebrew, and Arabic.

Finalists will be announced on September 22, 2022, at 1:00 pm EST/8:00 pm Jerusalem Time.

Winners will be announced on Oct 6, 2022, at 1:00 pm EST/8:00 pm Jerusalem Time.