The ”Marianna V. Vardinoyannis” Foundation, with the support of the Arsakeia-Tositseia Schools Society for the Promotion of Education & Learning  and in collaboration with the Ministry of Education and Religions, announces a Panhellenic Student Essay Competition entitled “The Battle of Thermopylae and the Battle of Salamis 2.500 years later, valuing the two events for their importance to the modern world and culture“.

 

TO WHOM IT IS ADRESSED:

The Competition is addressed to the students of the 3rd grade of the Gymnasiums, and the 1st and 2nd grade of the Lyceums of the Academic Year 2019-2020, throughout Greece, who, on the occasion of the completion of 2,500 years from the Battle of Thermopylae and the naval battle of Salamis, are called

  1. a) to highlight the historical significance of these events not only for the course of the Greek culture but also of the European culture,
  2. b) to consider the possibility of this historical occurrence to work as a guide for the future of the new generation.

The individual objectives of the Competition are:

  • Information, awareness, reflection and motivation of the students regarding the events of the Battle of Thermopylae and the Battle of Salamis on the occasion of the celebration of the 2500th Anniversary of these landmarks in Greek history.
  • The promotion of the idea of ​​intercultural dialogue.
  • Cultivation of the ideals of selflessly defending peace, freedom and democracy.
  • Development of students’ creative abilities, as well as their critical thinking.

 

For the evaluation of the writings of the Competition, the following will be taken into consideration:

Originality, argumentation, expression / formulation, cohesion, critical thinking and composition ability

Competition Documents

Compliance (PDF)

Privacy Policy (.docx)

Terms of COMPETITION

The length of the essays should not exceed 2,000 words.

The essays must be original, individual papers, not written in teaching hours and submitted on a pc or laptop.

Details:

The essays should be written in Arial font, size 14 pt, with a space of 1.5 pt. and should be delivered printed on double-sided A4 pages, with pagination on the top right so that they are legible.

The name, school and class of the student should be indicated on a separate sheet that will function as a cover whose back will be blank (without printing).

Students will use printed and electronic bibliography of their choice, making a clear and substantiated reference to their sources. The Evaluation Committee is not obliged to evaluate essays that do not meet these requirements.

COMPETITION TIMETABLE:

The competition started on February 12, 2020 and lasted until April 1.

The submission of the essays to the Schools Administrations has been postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The written essays will be submitted to the schools, together with a Parental Consent Form, from September 21 to September 30, 2020. The schools will have to send them to the Secondary Directorate of their district until October 8, 2020. The Secondary Directorates will have to give numeration to the essays, cover personal data (name / class / school) of the students and then hand them over to the Primary Evaluation Committee, which will be appointed from each of the Directorates to evaluate the essays.

Each Committee will be without payment and will consist of three (3) to five (5) members, teachers of Secondary Directorate (philologists), who will evaluate the submitted anonymous writings and classify them based on the score they received. Then, without disclosing the students data, they will send the ones with the excellent score (98 / 100-100 / 100) to the relevant regional Secondary Directorate by October 23, 2020. The Directorates must select 1 essay that will be sent by post (total 13 essays from the 13 Regional Directorates) until October 30, 2020 addressed to the Special Scientific Committee for the competition of the Marianna V. Vardinoyannis Foundation (address: Marianna V. Vardinoyannis Foundation, 12A Herodou Attikou str, 15124 Maroussi, Athens) that consists of University teachers and distinguished personalities of education and culture. The Special Scientific Committee will evaluate and select the 3 essays to win the awards by November 9, 2020.

The results of the evaluation will be announced by the Marianna V. Vardinoyannis Foundation in November 2020.

The members of both the Primary Evaluation Committees and the Special Scientific Committee of the MVV Foundation will evaluate the essays and rate them in terms of content (50/100), expression-form-language (30/100) and thought process structure (20/100). The final grade will be the sum of these three individual grades.

 

AWARD PRESENTATION CEREMONY:

The students who will win the Competition will be awarded their prizes in a special ceremony in Athens, which will take place on a date determined by the “Marianna V. Vardinoyannis Foundation”.

The travel and accommodation expenses of the thirteen (13) finalists of the competition and one (1) accompanying person for each student, for their participation in the award ceremony, will be covered by the “Marianna V. Vardinoyannis Foundation”.

 

AWARDS:

The students who will win the Competition will be awarded their prizes in a special ceremony in Athens, which will take place on a date determined by the “Marianna V. Vardinoyannis Foundation”.

The prizes for the winners will be three (3) and will be awarded as follows:

  1. Three-day educational trip (2 overnights) for one award-winning student with an accompanying person in London, England for visits to museums.
  2. Three-day educational trip (2 overnights) for one award-winning student with an accompanying person in Paris, France for visits to museums.
  3. Three-day educational trip (2 overnights) for one award-winning student with an accompanying person in Rome, Italy for visits to museums.

Each award covers the expenses for:

Transportation to and from each destination country, accommodation, meals,  transportation from and to the museums as well as museum tickets for each award-winning student and one accompanying person.

A special commendation will also be given to the 10 students whose essay was included in the 13 papers of the final phase of the competition.

 

TERMS AND CONDITIONS:

It is pointed out that the materialization of the Panhellenic Student Essay Competition, which will be implemented outside the school program schedule and context, will take place if the following conditions are met:

The participation of students in the Competition is optional, outside the school program schedule and context, while the evaluation of the essays by the Committees will not be taken into account for the general in-school evaluation of the student’s performance.

There is also no financial burden for students or their school. For the participation of the students, the parental consent is required, which will be stated in a formal declaration, submitted at the school of each student.

The organizing body that undertakes the process of implementing the Competition will ensure the protection of the students’ personal data and the copyrights of the essays. There will be no revenue for the Marianna V. Vardinoyannis Foundation or any other, from marketing or advertising of the submitted projects, and the use of them will be only for educational purposes. In addition, a formal declaration will be requested from the supervisor of each student that he or she agrees to publish the work of the student online or in a printable version, in accordance with the terms of the Competition. The Competition will be held off school schedule.

 

The Special Scientific Committee for the Evaluation of Projects consists of:      (name, title, institution):

Chairman:

Georgios Babiniotis, Professor of Linguistics, National & Kapodistrian University of Athens

President of the Arsakeia-Tositseia Schools, Society for the Promotion of Education & Learning

Members:

Costas Bourazelis, Professor at the Department of History-Archeology, School of Philosophy, University of Athens

Chryssa Maltezou, Academician, Emeritus Professor, University of Athens

Amfilochios Papathomas, Professor of Ancient Greek Philology-Papyrology, Department of Philology, Department of Classical Philology, University of Athens

Vasiliki Papapetrou-Moursela, Philologist, Superintendent of the Arsakeia-Tositseia Schools, Society for the Promotion of Education & Learning

 

CONDITIONS OF COMPETITION – DETAILS / ANNOUNCEMENTS:

To participate in the program, schools directors must visit the “Marianna V. Vardinoyannis Foundation” website, where they can find information on the process of submitting participations of their students in the Competition:

https://www.mvvfoundation.gr and https://www.thermopylaesalamis2020.gr

The names of the students who will win the Competition will be announced through the websites of the Foundation.

 

EVENT ADMINISTRATOR:

Marianna V. Vardinoyannis Foundation

Web: https://www.mvvfoundation.gr & https://www.thermopylaesalamis2020.gr

Email: [email protected]

Phone: 210 8094483 and 210 8094419.