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Creative Writing Competition
30/11/2020

One morning, in October, I opened my emails and clicked on one from Revolution Films. The subject of the email was ‘Creative Writing Competition’. Currently, I am always looking for opportunities to distract my pupils from the drag of the pandemic, so I thought, why not!

When I investigated further, I started to realise that it was no normal creative writing competition and in fact, it was Blackburn born film maker, Michael Winterbottom, who was asking pupils to submit a story about their lives in Blackburn as inspiration for a new film he was making. It, all of a sudden, got a lot more exciting!

I immediately shared the news with my brilliant year 9 class and their little faces lit up. They were so excited to write about their lives and to maybe, just maybe, see their story come to life on the big screen. There was also a huge prize up for grabs: £250 for first prize and £100 for second prize. The excitement in the classroom was palpable as they wondered whether they might take home the cash.

We spent a few lessons telling stories and fine tuning our drafts and before we knew it, it was time to pop them in the post and send them off to London. We waited in anticipation to see what Michael thought…

About a week later, I got the email:

"Hi Mrs O’Neill,

"Michael has thoroughly enjoyed reading all the stories. You clearly have some very talented and budding writers at your school. After much deliberation, Michael has chosen the below winners. He also wants to send a massive thank you to everyone for submitting their stories. And a big thank you to yourself for organising it all.

"Winner: Blackburn, 1974 by Fareeha

"Runner up: The Race by Hannah"


I couldn’t believe my eyes, feel more proud or wait to tell them.

The girls were understandably elated. I think my favourite part of the whole of experience was seeing the reaction of their peers; they celebrated their success and were just as proud as I was.

Watch this space, you might just see Blackburn, 1974 and The Race on a screen near you!