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Writing Competitions for Law Students: Planning & Law

Tip

Sponsors/facilitators of student writing competitions provide more detailed instructions and rules at their websites.  Students need to review the information and rules available at these websites.  

Planning & Law

Smith-Babcock-Williams Student Writing Competition (annual) + Description of last year's 2023 Competition

  • Sponsor: Planning & Law Division of the American Planning Association
  • Topic of 2023 Competition was: "The Competition, which honors the memory of three leading figures in American city planning law (R. Marlin Smith, Richard Babcock, and Norman Williams) is open to law students and planning students writing on a question of significance in planning, planning law, land use law, local government law or environmental law."
  • Eligibility requirement in 2023 Competition was: "The Competition is open to both current students and recent graduates (less than five years)."
  • Format in 2023 Competition was: "Entries can include articles written for academic journal or law review publication, long essays, or shorter essays (at least 2,000 words)."  "Each year, many of the entries appear to have been prepared initially for courses or seminars."
  • Prizes in 2023 Competition were: "[T]he winning entry will be awarded a prize of $3,000, the second-place paper will receive a prize of $1,000, and one honorable mention paper will receive $500.  All three winning entries will be published in the semi-annual newsletter of the Planning and Law Division.  Depending on the format of the winning entry and the interest of the author, the Competition Committee may also work with the winner to place the article in a journal or coordinate and present a Division webinar.  In 2021, a winning entry on vacant properties was the foundation of a webinar.  Last year’s winner is preliminarily slated for publication in The Urban Lawyer."
  • Deadline for submission in 2023 Competition was: June 30, 2023.  A March 4, 2024 email reply stated that information about the 2024 Competition "will be available on or before April 16 [2024] (The American Planning Association’s National Conference) with an end of June deadline similar to last year’s."  "Details will be available at https://www.planning.org/divisions/planningandlaw/writingcompetition."