Welcome to the Helium, Population Services International (PSI) and Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting’s “World population Approaches 7 Billion” contest. This is a special opportunity for anyone to write on issues related to world population. Helium members who are passionate about global health or independent international journalism are encouraged to join both of these important nonprofit organizations.
PSI and Pulitzer Center have partnered with Helium to connect writers concerned with population issues. This contest provides an opportunity for people passionate about the issue of world population to learn from each other and address concerns regarding the issue in a friendly, competitive and exciting event.
To learn more about the sponsors, visit the contest announcement page.
How the contest works:
- This contest consists of four titles with a two-week submission period. Please submit magazine-style articles between 400 and 500 words in length. The best articles will utilize and cite relevant data and statistics.
- Submission dates: Wednesday, June 8, at 00:00:01 GMT to Tuesday, June 21, at 23:59 GMT. For current GMT time, click HERE
- Awaiting calculation dates: After the submission period, an additional week is provided for article rating to reach community consensus. All titles in the contest are closed to further submissions and Leapfrogs during this time. (Your article’s rank may fluctuate wildly or hardly move.)
- Winners: The winners of the contest on this page will be displayed on the leaderboard on Wednesday, June 29. In the case of a tie in this contest, a panel will be assembled to determine the winners. Read more about winner selection and contest points on the Contest Rules page.
- Completed contest: Once the contest is closed and the results have been displayed on the leaderboard, the four top-ranked articles on each title will be reviewed by a panel of judges from PSI and Pulitzer Center. The panel will determine the winning article which will be published in the September issue of Impact, PSI’s quarterly print magazine. The top-ranked article from each title will be published on PSI’s Healthy Lives blog.
- The winning article will be announced on this page and the contest announcement page, as well as on PSI and Pulitzer’s websites.
- Titles The four titles for the contest are listed below.
Winners earn:
1 Apple iPad 1 Velocity Micro How to earn points:
- 5 points - over 95th percentile
- 4 points - over 85th percentile
- 3 points - over 75th percentile
- 2 points - over 65th percentile
- 1 points - over 55th percentile
- 0 points - over 45th percentile
- -1 points - over 35th percentile
- -2 points - over 25th percentile
- -3 points - over 15th percentile
- -4 points - over 5th percentile
- -5 points - 0- 5th percentile
Be sure to read a copy of Helium’s Writing Standards before you enter the contest.
This week's contest titles: