Story Theme:  Most Horrifying Summer Ever!

Eligibility:  Open to all Massachusetts middle and high school students

Submission Guidelines

• Theme: Most Horrifying Summer Ever!
• Send your story to contest@fluencyfactory.com.
• Your e-mail should have two separate MS Word documents attached:
• One MS Word document should contain your story, as follows:
  • The first line should contain the title of the story (please do not use "Most Horrifying Summer Ever!" as the title of your story).
  • Your name should NOT appear in this file.
  • Stories should not exceed five pages.
  • Format: 12 pt. Times New Roman, double-spaced
• The other MS Word document should contain this information:
  • The title of the story
  • Your name
  • Phone number
  • Home address
  • School & grade in September 2011
• The Fluency Factory reserves the right to use any of the submitted stories for promotional purposes.
• Deadline: August 31, 2011

Competition Winners

The winning stories will be announced on www.fluencyfactory.com on September 15th, 2011.  These cash prizes will be awarded:

• 1st – $ 125
• 2nd – $ 75
• 3rd – $ 25

We will publicize the names of the winning writers of course, and we will also publish names of writers who deserve honorable mention.

The top three stories will be posted on the Fluency Factory website.

Judges

The contest will be judged by these three employees of the Fluency Factory:

Maria E. Mayobre is an award-winning writer and screenwriter and was a tutor at the Fluency Factory.  Her first feature length screenplay, "Not Like Mom", won the 2009 Emerson Annual Screenwriting Prize and became a Semi-Finalist in the Blue Cat Screenplay Competition.  Her short films "Amber Alert" and "Marry Me" won two Filmaka short film competitions.  Her commercials "First Word" and "First Step" were both nominated for New England Emmy Awards in 2009.  In May 2010, her short story "Terrorista por Error" was selected by PEN Venezuela to be published in the fifth compilation of New Urban Narrative.

Dr. Kate Brannum has been working as a teacher and administrator for the last twenty years.  Currently she is a teacher at Beal Street Academy and The Fluency Factory.  She has taught at Mt. Holyoke College, Palm Beach Atlantic University, the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, and American Military University.  Kate received a Ph.D. in political science from University of Massachusetts.

Richard McManus is a nationally known expert, practitioner and trainer in the field of Precision Teaching.  He founded the Fluency Factory nine years ago to create a learning environment where all students could be highly successful.  Since then the Factory has served more than 600 students of all ages, assisting them in every way from early reading to SAT and college preparation.

Last Year's Competition

We were very happy with last year's contest.  To see last year's winners and their stories, click here.