Eleanor wins Cambridge essay 1st prize
Congratulations to Year 13 student, Eleanor Jones. Eleanor submitted an essay for the Trinity College Cambridge Linguistics Essay Prize. They were very pleased with the quantity of the submissions (97 – the second highest number of entries to date) and the high quality of the 2021 round.
Eleanor's essay was one of the very best we received, in fact of a standard that they might expect to read from a Year-1 university student. Following some difficult decisions they had to take, her essay was selected for the First Prize.
The judges made the following comments about Eleanor's essay:
Content
This essay showed an impressive command of the subject matter and sophisticated use of relevant evidence to support the author’s argument. In particular, the inclusion of the history of the word ‘villain’ was quite interesting to read.
Structure
Overall, the structure of this essay was easy to follow, however the first half of the essay was better written than the second half. You could consider using headings and sub-headings to signal to the reader what each section will talk about.
Style
This essay showed a good command of academic style of writing and was very well referenced throughout.
The competition carries a First Prize of £600, to be split equally between Eleanor and Leicester Grammar School. The school's portion of each prize will be issued in the form of book tokens with which to buy linguistics books.
Trinity College would very much like to encourage Eleanor to pursue her interests in linguistics in the future and to consider applying for a place to study Linguistics at university. They were also keen to express praise to Mr Pratt, Head of Classics, the teachers and all the staff who have created a learning environment where independent thinking and scholarship can thrive!