The Concord Review (history research paper publication) and the Emerson Prize

Around 5 percent, which makes it one of the hardest thresholds in secondary-level academic publishing. It is worth being clear that it is not a contest but a quarterly journal: submissions are read on a rolling basis and selected on scholarly merit, with no slot allocation or regional advancement. The competition is the most serious student historians worldwide, and every essay must be original, single-author work - co-authored submissions are not accepted.

The journal suggests 5,000 to 10,000 words or more, counting endnotes and bibliography. Published essays average over 8,000 words and some exceed 15,000. That length usually exceeds a typical history class or AP research paper, so a realistic starting point is expanding a research project already completed at school with additional primary sources rather than starting a new topic from zero.

It helps substantially, but it is not a guarantee. A roughly 5 percent acceptance rate and college-level length make it immediately legible to admissions readers as the product of sustained independent research, and that reads well across the University of California system too. What actually converts it is being able to explain in a personal insight essay how the topic emerged, how sources were weighed, and how the argument formed - list the essay title and issue rather than just saying 'published.'

Yes. Submitting requires a concurrent journal membership: $70 for the ebook edition, $110 with print delivery inside the US, and $150 internationally. Every submitting author receives four issues, and ebook subscribers can add print copies for $30 plus shipping. The charge is a subscription rather than a reading fee, and it is not refunded based on the outcome, so treat it as a one-time cost when planning.

Four deadlines feed four issues: August 1, November 1, February 1, and May 1, and each submission stays in consideration for the next three issues. A workable rhythm is choosing the topic and reading sources over summer, drafting during the fall semester alongside regular coursework, revising over winter break, and submitting by February 1 - or aiming for May 1 instead if fall is already busy, to stay clear of finals week.

Turabian, meaning Chicago style, with endnotes only - no footnotes - numbered in Arabic numerals and each note ending with a period. The bibliography must not list anything that is not cited in the text. Write in that format from the first draft; converting later is extremely time-consuming, and a non-compliant manuscript makes a poor first impression on the editor. At a 5 percent acceptance rate, that is an entirely avoidable deduction.

No. The Emerson Prize is chosen from among authors published in The Concord Review that year, at $1,000 each - volume 36 had eleven recipients, and more than 250 students have won it since 1995. The $5,000 Fitzhugh Prize, named for the journal's founder, is likewise awarded annually to one already-published author. In other words, having the essay accepted and published is the prerequisite for any prize.

There is no evidence that any Irvine public high school runs a club dedicated to this journal, so most students work one-on-one with a history teacher or writing mentor instead. The topic needs to be narrow and deep - one piece of local legislation, one archive, one figure's specific decision - and built on primary sources such as newspaper databases, government records, and oral histories. When a school has no matching resource, EDUBUS's small-group history writing sessions can serve as an outside supplement.