Student Essay Contest

Join the conversation, showcase your ideas on public policy, and enter our essay contest for the chance to win the grand cash prize! Winning essays may be published in Fraser Institute journals and authors will have the opportunity to experience the peer review process.

2023 Essay Contest - What would our Essential Scholars say about the world today?

Unprecedented is a word that has been used repeatedly to describe all aspects of the last two years: global pandemic, centralized lockdowns, overwhelmed health care facilities, high inflation, revolutionized AI, war in Ukraine, etc. Governments often respond to remarkable moments in history by creating policies they feel would help address the situation. What insight can our Essential Scholars series offer the current situations and events? Relying on the ideas of one of our Essential Scholars, construct an essay that describes a scholar’s response, explanation, or rebuttal to a current event. You can use a scholar’s economic theory to examine unprecedented situations, propose potential policies that a scholar would have put forward, or suggest how certain existing policies would have been adapted by a particular Essential Scholar.

Example Questions:

What would Milton Friedman argue should be a government’s response to inflation?
In a post-COVID world, what would Jane Jacobs say about the state of our cities?
How does James Buchanan’s thoughts on public choice theory apply to the economic sanctions imposed on Russia following its invasion of Ukraine?
How can Joseph Schumpeter’s concept of creative destruction help us understand the rise and fall of businesses?
What would one of the Essential Scholars say about Canada’s current housing and rent situation?

Learn more about essay contest requirements and submssion process by reading our 2023 Contest Rules and FAQ Student Essay Contest 2023.

Visit www.essentialscholars.org to read our Essential Scholars books online and watch the accompanying videos.

Submission Deadline: June 1, 2023

New Categories and Prizes:

Prizes	High School	Undergraduate	Graduate
1^st Prize	$1,500	$1,500	$1,500
2^nd Prize	$1,000	$1,000	$1,000
3^rd Prize	$750	$750	$750
4^th Prize	$500	$500	$500
5^th Prize	$250	$250	$250

Useful Links

2022 Essay Contest Winners

	1st Place ($1,500)
High School Category	Jack Millos, West Point Grey Academy
Undergraduate	Allison Knee, Memorial University of Newfoundland
Graduate	Isabella Giancola, Columbia University
	2nd Place ($1,000)
High School Category	Irene Berezin, Westmount High School
Undergraduate	Shal Marriott, Carleton University
Graduate	Samuel Yacob, Caleton University
	3rd Place ($500)
High School Category	Lucas Orfanides, St. Augustine Catholic High School
Undergraduate	Lucas Lazzaroni, University of British Columbia
Graduate	Jerred Kiss, Harvard University