  Contests & Activities
This week: Contest Judging Guidelines Edited by: 🦄🏳️🌈Sapph  
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The purpose of this newsletter is to share my thoughts, ideas, and experience with anything and everything relating to contests and activities. Information from me to you on entering and running activities here on Writing.Com.
Today's Topic
Contest Judging |
| ASIN: B01DSJSURY |
Product Type: Kindle Store
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Amazon's Price: $ 5.99
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Being a contest judge isn't for the feint of heart or weak-willed person. It can take quite a bit of time to read through contest entries and make a decision on who should be the winner(s) of any given round. It takes quite a bit of effort to put in to be done well and needs a certain set of goals to be done well. I'm going to explain a few things that I follow when I judge and what I look for in those who judge contests I'm in charge of on WDC.
The first things that comes to mind are time and dedication. Are you willing to read potentially dozens of entries, rate them how you see fit, and then give out the decision of who will that contest? Many contests don't get that many entries (aside from the WDC Official Contest, that is) so you don't have to worry about quite so many but it does still take some effort to get into the spirit of judging. If you can't put in the time, it can lead to contests being judged late. Now, for real life situations that may get in the way that's understandable but consistently not being able to judge on time can be a problem.
The second thing that I like with judging is to have a system. How am I willing to rate these entries so that everything is fair. Am I putting more emphasis on the prompt and that it was followed or am I going to put more focus on the quality of the writing? How do I determine if an entry should be disqualified? This is something I think is essential for every judge to have so that they have a "judging style" and judge a contest more quickly because of it.
Are you willing to give out reviews when you judge? I know a number of contests where reviews only happen once in a while when judging, if at all. If someone takes the time to enter a contest, at least a quick review so they know you've read the entry, so that they know someone saw what they put time into, is what I think should be necessary. With "The LGBT Writing Contest - December 2024" we debated getting rid of reviews but decided that it was the least we could do for the entries. It helps that there aren't a ton every round and there are multiple judges, but even if we didn't have that we would want to give out reviews.
Lastly, don't stretch yourself too far with judging. There are only so many things a single person can do and you shouldn't be trying to judge twenty different contests while dealing with your own life things. That can get ridiculous and inevitably hold up multiple contests, which could lose entries in the future because members tend to not enter again if something takes too long to get results.
These are just some of my personal guidelines with judging and I'd love to here some that you have as well! Submit to the newsletter below your own judging style or what you look for in a judge for your contest! |
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| ASIN: B004PICKDS |
Product Type: Toys & Games
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Amazon's Price: Price N/A
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My question for you this time: What kinds of experiences have you had with judging a contest on WDC?
Question from before ("Contests & Activities Newsletter (November 4, 2015)" ): What are your favorite aspects about a raffle, whether running one or participating in one? What is it you look for to draw you to it?
While this wasn't an answer to that question, this comment from Bikerider  spurred me to write on this topic:
Here's something I think is worth mentioning.
I judge a couple of contests here on WDC and have for a few years now. What I've found is that for every 5 reviews I give as a judge, I receive 2 responses, usually Thank You.
I wonder if there are people who don't know that the contest judges give their time voluntarily. Do some people understand that without judges, there would be no contest?
Remember folks, if you receive a review, whether it's from a contest judge or just a random review, saying thank you, or better yet, giving a reciprocal review, is the least you can do to show your appreciation for the time and effort contest judges give. |
| ASIN: B004PICKDS |
Product Type: Toys & Games
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Amazon's Price: Price N/A
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Contests & Activities: November 18, 2015 Issue [#7332]
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