queen's commonwealth essay competition 2021 winners

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Camilla congratulates winners of Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition

The Duchess of Cornwall drew words of wisdom from a favourite redheaded literary character (and met another famous ginger) when she welcomed young winners of the Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition to St James’s Palace for a special reception.

Sharing a passage from the novel “Anne of Green Gables,” Camilla, who serves as Vice Patron of the Royal Commonwealth Society, spoke about the special bond members of the Commonwealth share.

“To quote the famous Canadian literary character, Anne of Green Gables, ‘I’m so thankful for friendship: it beautifies life so much,'” she said. “Our Commonwealth community gives each of us 2.4 billion friends. And I believe the 2.4 billion of us do much to beautify life for one another: rejoicing in each other’s successes, benefitting from each other’s wisdom, and supporting and sustaining one another through difficult times.”

Along with award-winners and their families, competition judges, and literary figures, Geri Horner, better known as Ginger Spice of The Spice Girls, also attended the event. Horner, who serves as a Royal Commonwealth Society Ambassador, greeted Camilla in a video tweeted by Daily Mail reporter Rebecca English. In the footage, Camilla chatted with the star, telling her that Prince Charles was “a complete workaholic” when Horner asked how he was doing.

The Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition is the world’s oldest international writing competition for schools and each year, young people are asked to submit essays responding to a specific theme. The Duchess of Cornwall congratulated the 2021 senior winner, 16-year-old Kayla Bosire from Nairobi, Kenya, and the two runners-up, Aditi Nair and Raisa Gulati, both from India. Due to travel restrictions, Camilla presented a certificate via video call to 13-year-old Ethan Charles Mufuma from Mukono, Uganda, who was this year’s junior winner.

During the event, the Duchess of Cornwall also met Cassandra Nguyen, the 2020 Junior Winner from Canada, since the 2020 awards were presented virtually.

Camilla also shared her joy at the essay competition’s record-breaking number of entries, with 25,648 young people submitting essays – the most since the contest began in 1883. She went on to give her own version of an essay based on this year’s theme, “Community in the Commonwealth,” although she noted she doubted “that they would qualify me as a Senior Winner – or even a very, very Senior Winner.”

Speaking about the power of storytelling, the Duchess of Cornwall praised how “the young people who enter this Competition bring us together with their powerful stories, essays, poetry and letters on the issues that most matter today, making the profound accessible.”

Ending her speech by stressing her determination “to visit more Commonwealth countries as soon as I can,” the Duchess of Cornwall circled back to Anne Shirley. “And now I shall heed more wise words from Anne of Green Gables,” she said, sharing that “the point of good writing is knowing when to stop.” 

The Royal Commonwealth Society, founded in 1868, works to improve the Commonwealth through efforts in youth empowerment, education and high-level advocacy. The Society founded The Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition “to promote literacy, expression, and creativity among young people” throughout the Commonwealth’s 54 member nations.

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Winners of the Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition 2021

Heartiest congratulations for the winners of The Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition – the world’s oldest international writing competition for schools, established in 1883.

Gold Award Winners 

• Senugi Wijesinghe –   Senior Category (Year 11 Com)
• Binuthi Sithumya Gangodagedara –  Senior Category (Year 11 Sc2)
• Chanumi Nanayakkara – Junior Category

Silver Award Winners

• Thirani Perera –- Senior Category (Year11 Sc2)
• Kavya Sammodini Weerasuriya  – Senior Category (Year12 Sc1)
• Liana Perera    – ( Year10 Com 1)

Bronze award winner

• Danel Silva –- Junior Category

You are winner today because you seized the opportunity when it was opened up for you and you were determined to do your best in what you do.

For that we are proud of you!

Christabel, Rui Yu among gold winners in Commonwealth essay competition

Christabel Lau

KUCHING (Oct 5): Christabel Lau and Ong Rui Yu of St Joseph’s International School (SJIS) here were among 171 gold finalists out of 25,648 participants in the Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition 2021.

According to a press statement, the Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition (QCEC), which was established in 1883, is the world’s oldest international writing competition for schools.

With thousands of young people taking part each year, it is an important way to recognise achievement, elevate youth voices and develop key skills through creative writing.

This year’s competition is themed ‘Community in the Commonwealth.’

For Lau, participating in competitions like QCEC allowed her to explore the depths of her creativity and expand her knowledge on what was happening around her.

“It took about a week for me to come up with different ideas on how I’d want the story to go. The story concept had been revised thrice before I was set on the current concept.

“It was my goal to make the drafting journey as fun as possible and it took about two months before I came up with a final draft that I was proud of,” she said.

She thanked her English teacher Ann Armstrong for introducing a variety of writing competitions last year and encouraging her students to participate in them.

“I probably wouldn’t have been aware of the QCEC without her. It was also because of her that I was able to improve my writing skills so drastically,” she said and encouraged students to challenge themselves in writing competitions.

“You really do learn and gain a lot of awareness on a variety of topics such as climate change, life and so on.”

Ong meanwhile chose to write on the topic ‘Keeping Connected through the Covid-19.’

“It was a challenge to gather my thoughts and feelings about an ongoing pandemic when all I wanted to do was escape from this world. It took one month of many idea changes, drafts, and edits before this work today.

”I wanted to show people and document their experiences – both highs and lows. Major sources of inspiration were ‘Night’ by Elie Wiesel and two pieces of music – ‘Moon Song’ by Karen O and ‘I’m Forrest…Forrest Gump’ by Alan Silvestri,” she said.

When Ong heard that she was one of the gold finalists, she said the news came like a “spring breeze amidst a period of stressful studying.”

“I felt grateful that God has granted me this achievement and I was pleased that my results have improved compared to last year’s Silver.

“I hope to hone my skills even more to achieve Winner next year if God wills it,” she said.

She encouraged aspiring writers to read more to expose themselves to different ways of expressions; to know what they’re trying to convey and to be creative.

“Understand your audience. QCEC is searching for creative, profound works and it’s an avenue to spill your hearts out. Most importantly, don’t stop halfway,” she said.

Meanwhile, Lydia Ting, also from SJIS, achieved a Silver Award from QCEC.

“It took me around five days to finish the essay and when news reached me that I had won Silver, I was very surprised and glad as it was really unexpected.

“I am beyond grateful and privileged to receive this award,” she said and thanked Armstrong for introducing and encouraging both her and her classmates to join this competition.

She said joining QCEC had opened her eyes and motivated her to become a better version of herself.

“I would like to encourage other students to join because you never know what you can achieve if you don’t try. Anything is possible if you set your heart on it and work hard.

“I myself am looking forward to writing again in the future,” said Ting.

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Camilla praises Commonwealth during award ceremony for essayists

The Duchess of Cornwall has paid tribute to the “unity, purpose and friendship” of the Commonwealth saying those who belong to it are “incredibly privileged”.

The duchess, delivering a speech at the prize-giving ceremony for the Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition (QCEC), said the 2.4 billion members of the Commonwealth “beautify life for one another”.

Camilla vice-patron of the Royal Commonwealth Society, hosted the awards for this year’s essay prize, welcoming young winners to London for a reception at St James’s Palace.

Geri Horner, the former Spice Girl, also attended the ceremony to read one of the winning essays, while singer Alexandra Burke accompanied Cassandra Nguyen, the 2020 Junior Winner from Canada, who met the duchess ahead of the ceremony.

When Horner asked after the Prince of Wales who was famously photographed with a lipstick kiss mark on his cheek after receiving a peck from the singer, the duchess told her he was “fine”, if a “complete workaholic”.

When the celebrity told the duchess about a book she had read which claimed working is the key to a long life, the duchess agreed “Don’t retire!” before joking “that’s not my problem.”

In a speech to guests, Camilla wondered aloud about what she would have written if she had entered the prize as a child, under the topic “Community in the Commonwealth”.

“I think it might go something like this,” she said.

“Those of us who are part of the Commonwealth of Nations are incredibly privileged to belong to this wonderful community of 54 countries, sharing a spirit of unity, purpose and friendship.

“To quote the famous Canadian literary character, Anne of Green Gables, ‘I’m so thankful for friendship: it beautifies life so much’.

“Our Commonwealth community gives each of us 2.4 billion friends.

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“And I believe the 2.4 billion of us do much to beautify life for one another: rejoicing in each other’s successes, benefiting from each other’s wisdom, and supporting and sustaining one another through difficult times.”

Saying she had already witnessed the power of the prize in her travels around the world, she added: “I am determined to visit more Commonwealth countries as soon as I can, and I promise you that I will always seek out the QCEC wherever I go.”

Founded in 1883, it is believed to be the world’s oldest international writing competition for schools and aims to promote literacy, expression, and creativity among young people throughout the Commonwealth.

This year, nearly 26,000 children entered on the theme “Community in the Commonwealth”, with 130 judges whittling entries down to a final four winners.

The winners were Kayla Bosire, aged 16 from Nairobi, Kenya who flew to London to be presented with her award, and 13-year-old Ethan Charles Mufuma, who had a Zoom call with the duchess from the British High Commission in Uganda.

Runners-up, who also visited St James’s Palace, were Aditi Nair aged 15 from New Delhi, India, and Raisa Gulati aged 14 from Amritsar, India.

Judges included bestselling author Dame Susan Hill, author Hiya Chowdhury, head of research for the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust Dr Paul Edmondson, poet, painter and writer Sia Figiel, theatre maker Femi Elufowoju Jr, and Emeritus Professor Satendra Nandan from Fiji.

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THE QUEEN'S COMMONWEALTH ESSAY COMPETITION 2020

The 2020 competition attracted nearly 13,000 entries on the theme: Climate Action and the Commonwealth. 130 volunteer judges, drawn from 40 different countries across the Commonwealth, assessed the entries with the final judging decision taken by an expert panel of authors, journalists and poets, which included the writer Anthony Horowitz; written word poet Suli Breaks; journalist Matthew Parris; novelist Wendy Holden; award-winning YA author Zalika Reid-Benta; and the Commonwealth Writer's Prize winner and poet, Sia Figiel. 

The 2020 Winners and Runners-up were drawn from across the Commonwealth (Singapore, India, Canada and Ghana) and wrote inspiring poems, essays and narratives on the topic 'Climate Action and the Commonwealth'. 

In 2020 we were also delighted to host our first virtual Awards Ceremony. The virtual ceremony revealed the winners and featured readings of their award-winning pieces. The ceremony included notable literary figures, actors, and humanitarians from across the Commonwealth.

Ambassadors of the Royal Commonwealth Society, David Walliams and Alexandra Burke, were joined by British actor and writer, Stephen Fry, and Bollywood actress, Kareena Kapoor, to read extracts from the winning pieces during the ceremony.

The ceremony also featured highlights of workshops that the Winners and Runners-up had with the Society’s Ambassadors, Geri Horner (née Halliwell) and Lewis Pugh, to discuss their pieces on the theme of ‘Climate Action the Commonwealth.’

Senior Winner: Aditya Choudhury Singapore

Aditya Choudhury is a 14-year-old from Singapore. A ninth-grade student of GIIS, Singapore, Aditya is a fan of Star Wars, Marvel comics, Harry Potter, manga and graphic novels (not necessarily in that order!). He enjoys soccer, swimming and basketball, and credits the island’s National Parks for fostering his interest in the natural environment and wildlife welfare.

In his essay titled ‘Voices from the Blue World’, he imagined an underwater Commonwealth Conference of sea creatures in which the keynote speaker, a grouper, which is a native fish of Singapore, assures all the marine creatures of the Blue World that they have a bright future of coexistence with the human world – the Green World. Learning about the work done by Commonwealth nations to protect the oceans and browsing the Commonwealth Blue Charter website has been a hugely inspiring experience, which strengthened his belief that the Blue World of marine creatures and the Green World of humans can live like a wonderful brotherhood. The Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition on ‘Climate Action’ has made him value the power of words to unleash change and shape our future!  

Senior Runner-Up: Ananya Mukerji India

Ananya is a student of Grade 11 doing the International Baccalaureate Diploma Program (IBDP) at Dhirubhai Ambani International School. She has been writing creatively since she was 9 years old. Besides being passionate about writing, particularly poetry, she expresses herself through art and theatre.  She lives in Mumbai with her parents and her 2-year-old cocker spaniel, Tessa.

Junior Winner: Cassandra Nguyen Canada

Cassandra Nguyen is 13 years old and lives in Ontario, Canada. She is in Grade 8 and currently attends Ashton Meadows Public School in Ontario, Canada.

She has enjoyed both reading and writing stories since she was very young and literature has always been important to her because when she reads a poem or a book, it almost feels like you are being taken to the world that the author created.  

Junior Runner-Up: Eleni Bazikamwe Ghana

Eleni was born on 5 January 2010 in Nairobi, Kenya, and is the daughter of a Belgian mother and a Greek-Burundese father. She has spent the first years of her childhood in Kenya and moved to Accra at the age of 5 where her father is currently working for the EU Delegation to Ghana.

Eleni joined the Ghana International School where she has made lots of friends and got a wonderful academic education, especially last year with Mrs Amponsah-Tawiah who taught her a lot about how to write great stories.

Throughout her travels across the Kenyan savannahs and the beautiful Ghanaian coast, Eleni has had the opportunity to see how wonderful the environment is, but also how vulnerable it is, which is why she was so happy to participate in The Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition. She’s very much inspired by Greta Thunberg, but also enjoys playing the piano, reading Jaqueline Wilson books, playing tennis and baking all sorts of goodies.

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The Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition 2021 (Win a Trip to London)

• Deadline June 30, 2021

Invitation to enter The Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition 2021 is open!

The Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition is the world’s oldest international writing competition for schools, established in 1883. With thousands of young people taking part each year, it is an important way to recognize achievement, elevate youth voices and develop key skills through creative writing.

For 2021 the Competition theme is “Community in the Commonwealth”. With the global spread of COVID-19, the world has seen the lives of many Commonwealth citizens affected. However, through adversity, societies came together and stories of growth, community and hope continue to emerge.

Looking for fully-funded opportunities, install the Youth Opportunities  Android  or  iOS  App here.

The Society has a rich history of nurturing the creative talents of young people around the Commonwealth and they endeavor to promote literacy, expression, and creativity by celebrating excellence and imagination.

Benefits of the competition include:

• One Winner and Runner Up will be chosen from each category.
• Winners and Runners Up (accompanied by one adult/guardian) will be brought to London for a week of educational and cultural events, culminating in a special Awards Ceremony.
• A number of Gold Finalist, Gold, Silver and Bronze Awards will be given in both the Senior and Junior categories, rewarding excellence in writing.
• All successful entries will receive a Certificate of Participation.

Eligibilities

• The Competition invites all young Commonwealth citizens and residents, regardless of region, education or background, to share ideas, celebrate their story and have their voice heard.
• Residents of non-Commonwealth countries whose entries are submitted through their local RCS branch are also eligible.

Application Process

Apply online through the Apply Now link.

Application Deadline: June 30, 2021

For Further Queries

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The Diana Award 2024

Government of Ireland Postgraduate Scholarship 2024

IUCN Leaders Forum – Call for Changemakers 2024 in Switzerland (Fully Funded)

One Young World Pernod Ricard Scholarship 2024 (Fully Funded)

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