First of all, we apologize for the long period of time it took us to process the contest entries. Some already know some of this information; we received a whopping 93 entries this year. Out of these, we narrowed them down by the rules; high school student, font size and style, word count, and double spacing.

We then split those that were left into two groups; closest to the word count and alternatives that was slightly under the word count. The judges looked at the story content, grammar, and continuity. Each judge picked the top three and honorable mentions. Each story was rated and the numbers tallied. The highest tally was the first place and so on.

Letters are going out to all of the students this week to let them know their standing in the contest. The work on the anthology is in progress and the available date will be posted for the contestants and their family.

We want to thank all the students, teachers, and parents for the great participation in the contest.

Side notes about the participates: there were 35 boys and 55 girls, from over 26 high schools represented from around Iowa. We did have one seventh grader send a very good story, meeting the other criteria, but was not eligible because she was not in high school, bummer. We invite her to enter the contest when she becomes a high school student.

Iowa Author Fest Committee