2009 Edu Blogger Scholarship Contest
Introducing the winners of the 2009 Edu Blogger Scholarship and the 2 Lucky Edu Blogger Scholarships
After reviewing the posts of the 20 finalists, each of the 3 judges (Matt Herzberger from BlogHighEd.org, Stewart Foss from eduStyle and Karine Joly from Collegewebeditor.com) gave a score to every post in the following categories:- Have you learned anything interesting by reading this post? (5 points)
- How original is the topic of this blog post? (5 points)
- Does this post engage its readers (as opposed to just pushing a specific message)? (5 points)
- Can the post title work as a stand alone (in search engine, aggreagators, etc.)? (1 point)
- Would you share this post on Twitter or your own blog? (1 point)
The highest scorer (43/51) was then declared the winner of the 2009 Edu Blogger Scholarship worth $1,500: The Old College Try for Top Distance Learning Marketing Challenges
The 2 Lucky Edu Blogger Scholarships - worth $500 - each were drawn among all the 28 contest participants using random.org, each one by a different judge. The third judge matched the 2 lucky numbers with the list of all the participants (alphabetized by last name of the blogger).
The winners of the 2 Lucky Edu Blogger Scholarships are Shelley Keith from eironae.com (#16 drawn by Stewart) and Heidi Cool from the Web Development Blog (#7 drawn by Matt)
Thanks and congratulations to all the participants. Keep up the good blogging!
The 20 finalists of the Edu Blogger Scholarship Contest
The "popularity" phase is now over and the judges will start to evaluate the submitted posts to select the winner of the Grand prize to be announced on April 15 on this page.Here are the 20 finalists that have referred the most visitors to the contest page between March 18 and March 30, 2009. They are listed in alphabetical order.
- al-jamiat.com
- blogs.oc.edu
- christine.smcbloggers.com
- dontwasteyourtime.co.uk
- eironae.com
- elearningpundit.com
- heidicool.com
- highedwebtech.com
- highered.prblogs.org
- higheredmarketing.blogspot.com
- isupportuoregon.org
- karlynmorissette.karlyn.me
- killjill.wordpress.com
- learnqtp.com
- murcha.wordpress.com
- nick.smcbloggers.com
- sekolahbogorraya.edublogs.org
- simpsonscarborough.com/blog
- teachingcollegeenglish.com
- ukwebfocus.wordpress.com
Why an Edu Blogger Scholarship Contest?
We know edu bloggers spend countless hours researching, writing and promoting their love for education with little prospects of any monetary reward. An edu blog is a labor of love. Period. We think it's about time for the edu bloggers to get a chance to justify their efforts to their spouse, significant other, family, friends, coworkers, pet and in the case of institutional bloggers - boss.Unfortunately, blogging for the glory doesn't always cut it
What is the Edu Blogger Scholarship Contest?
Administrated by higher ed blogger Karine Joly on the behalf - and with the generous support - of www.onlinecollege.org, this contest will award a total of 3 non-renewable edu blogger scholarships to help support the blogging work of the winners:- The 2009 Edu Blogger Scholarship (worth $1,500)
This scholarship will be awarded after a 2-step selection process based on 1) popularity as well as 2) the quality and originality of a blog post about online education written by the blogger for this contest.
Popularity will be evaluated via referrer traffic data sent to the contest page by the participating blog - as reported by the Google Analytics account set up for this purpose. The top 20 eligible referring blogs will be selected for the second phase of the contest.
The 2009 Edu Blogger Scholarship will be selected among these 20 finalists and awarded by a panel of 3 higher ed blogger judges (Matt Herzberger, co-founder of Blog High Ed, Stewart Foss, eduStyle Awards Creator and Karine Joly). Judges will take into account the quality and originality of the post as well as the overall quality of the blog in their scoring. - 2 Lucky Edu Blogger Scholarships (worth $500 each)
These 2 scholarships will be awarded after a drawing among all the eligible contest participants - at the exception of the winner of the 2009 Edu Blogger Scholarship.
Are you eligible for the Edu Blogger Scholarship contest?
This contest is open to bloggers (i.e. individuals or organizations writing a blog) who:- focus their blogging mainly on topics related to K-12 or higher ed education at large. For example, blogs dealing with academics, educational technology, learning, college preparation or selection, universities and colleges are all eligible. Blogs focused on another topic with a couple of posts about education are not. Judges will evaluate eligibility on this criterion at their own discretion.
- blog in English (only one of our 3 judges is fully bilingual, so we'll stick with English)
- are based on Earth (sorry, dear Martian bloggers). In other words, the contest isn't restricted to a specific country or region. American, Canadian, Australian, British, Indian and other bloggers are all welcome.
- complete the contest entry procedure described below by March 17, 2009 at 11PM US Eastern Time and are still in compliance at the time of the judging and drawing.
- have or create a PayPal account to receive payment of the scholarship via a PayPal transfer if they win.
Let's recap important dates
- Contest entry submission deadline:
March 17, 2009 at 11PM US Eastern Time - "Popularity" phase of the contest:
March 18 - March 30, 2009 11PM US Eastern Time - Scholarship Winners Announcement:
April 15, 2009
