Tips for Winning the Scholastic Art Awards
Are you in 7th-12th grade and live in the US or Canada? You can enter your artwork in the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards! This is an art competition which starts regionally. You can win an Honorable Mention, Silver Key, or Gold Key award. If you win a Gold Key, your artwork will be judged for the national competition! This is great if you are a young artist who wants to get recognized for your artwork. I have participated for multiple years and won two regional Honorable Mentions and two regional Gold Key awards, and I have some tips on how you can have a better chance at winning!
Creating Artwork
The first step is to create art! The awards offer many different categories to submit your art into, so you can pretty much create whatever you want! There are some rules, however, for what you can and cannot submit. I recommend looking these over before you start your artwork or submit it.
The judges also look for certain aspects of your artwork when they are judging. According to artandwriting.org, the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards website, they are looking for “originality, skill, and the emergence of a personal voice or vision.” They want your work to be original and not copied from another artwork, show skill whether it be technical or creative, and they want your piece to be unique and different from other artwork that they have seen.
My biggest tip when creating your work if you are trying to win an award is to be creative! When I’ve seen the award-winning pieces in person, most pieces were different from artwork that you would typically see. Try planning out your work before making it and make changes as necessary! I drew multiple sketches of a dress I made before deciding on the final design which won a regional Gold Key award!
Adding Entries
There are a couple of steps when you are creating your entries for the Scholastic Art Awards. However, I do have some tips on how to add your entries. First of all, you will want to select the correct category for your artwork. The awards offer multiple different categories, many of which are similar. For example, you may be deciding on whether to enter your piece into either the “drawing” or “illustration” category. Either is fine, just read over the description of each and decide what your piece best fits into.
The next tip I have is to get good photographs of your work. Make sure to edit your photos so that it looks as similar to the real-life piece as possible. Check out my post on photographing artwork for more tips!
Lastly, all you have to do is submit your work for judging! Each entry is $10 (as of 2026) and each portfolio entry is $30. If you cannot afford this, they do offer a fee waiver so you do not have to pay.
I hope that this post helps you and inspires you to submit artwork to the Scholastic Art Awards! Remember to just have fun with it and enjoy the process of making art!