NE writing contest allows students chance to cash in

By Matt Koper/ne news editor

NE Campus’ literary magazine is calling for written and video entries into the bi-annual Under the Clock Tower writing contest by April 6.

Students can submit a video essay or poem, a short nonfiction story, a short fiction story or a written poem.

The video essay or poem can be four minutes or less, the short nonfiction and fiction stories can be 200-3,000 words and the poem can be 3-60 lines.

The first-place winner in each category will receive cash prizes of $50 and will be published in Under the Clock Tower this fall. Entries that do not place might still be published in the magazine.

English associate professor Rebecca Balcarcel, who is one of the judges, said they want to see fresh material.

“We like original subject matter,” she said. “There’s too many love poems. There are too many spiritual poems. You can write a fantastic love poem or a fantastic spiritual poem, but it’s difficult. So when I come across a poem about a homeless person, I get really excited immediately. Original subject matter gets the judge’s attention.”

Balcarcel said she is one of seven faculty members alongside Algirdas Lekavicius and Suzanne Holcombe-Grey, two of her former students, who judge the contest, so “different tastes can all be represented.”

For more information or to submit to the contest, visit http://undertheclocktower.submittable.com/submit, or contact Balcarcel at rebecca.balcarcel@tccd.edu or by phone at 817-586-8046.