About the Shine Awards
What is Shine?
The Shine School Media Awards is a national, free-to-enter competition rewarding UK secondary schools who produce an outstanding newspaper, magazine, podcast or website.
The culmination of the competition is a spectacular gala awards ceremony held in the City of London each summer.
Shine is proving to be a hugely beneficial project for the future potential of all students involved, boosting CVs and university application forms. Shine has significant benefits for teachers too, meeting the requirements of the school curriculum.
Building a Shine Awards-eligible project is directly relevant to a number of exams and a school media project can contribute to the following:
- GCSE Media Studies: both Section A – Media Language and Media Representations; and Section B – Media Industries and Media Audiences
- AQA AS and A Level Media Studies: Unit 2 Creating Media and Unit 4 Media Research and Production
- BTEC Level 3 National Diploma in Creative Digital Media Production: Digital Publishing
Your coursework for any of these exams could well also count as an entry if it’s a newspaper, magazine (online, PDF or print edition), podcast or website.
What does Shine try to achieve?
Overall, the goals of Shine are multi-faceted, with the primary aims being to:
- Encourage an interest in developing print and digital publishing skills in young people, helping them to improve literacy, nurture creativity, develop commercial and business skills, encourage teamwork and develop leadership skills
- Raise awareness and understanding of the skills required by the media and graphic arts industries, such as commercial awareness, leadership, editorial flair, circulation strategy and design and production and encourage school-leavers to consider the media and graphic arts industries as a career choice
- Raise awareness of the importance of respecting copyright and the ownership of intellectual property
- Develop an informed awareness of the need for sustainable strategies to address environmental issues
- Promote interaction between departments within schools, including English, Art & Design, Business Studies and IT, interaction with the local community and between pupils, teachers and the wider business community
‘The pen is mightier than the sword’, and never has this been more true than in these days of global communication where an image or a sentence can change the course of our cultures.
The Shine competition exists to encourage the crafting of the words and images of our nation’s young people, and to further their opportunities through links with the communications industries.
By recognising the energy and creativity of schoolchildren with an awards ceremony we are not only celebrating their hard work and exuberant voices, but also illuminating potential paths into the world after school. By inviting schools from all over the country to partake, we are also creating a forum for them to share their experiences and points of view.
We seek to broaden our national reach further every year, and hope to expand international entries in the near future.
– Alison Strachan, Chair of Shine
Find out what it's like to attend Shine
What you have to do to enter:
- Encourage pupils to build production of a newsletter, magazine, website or podcast (all categories eligible for Shine) into their programme or introduce a team project
- Register your interest
- Submit your school’s chosen entry by the entry deadline with a completed entry form
What your school could win:
- All winners will be invited to an awards ceremony in the City of London in the summer
- All winning entries will receive a handsome trophy to retain
- An overall winner will receive the Harrison Cup to retain for one year
- A framed certificate
- A wide range of work experience opportunities
Latest Tweets
Shine School Media Awards
@shinemediawards - Jun 23
We're thrilled to announce the full list of shortlisted schools for the Shine School Media Awards 2023 >>> https://t.co/lQFVE0WWcs https://t.co/w4hSAbqvy2
Shine School Media Awards
@shinemediawards - Mar 23
Every summer at the Shine School Media Awards, our prizes include Masterclasses for exceptional students - today, a story about his experience from Neelkantha a student @ThePerseSchool >>> https://t.co/gtYwZMraKi https://t.co/0nBN23prUy
Shine School Media Awards
@shinemediawards - Feb 23
Last summer, Hilary Hanslin from Ibstock Place School won Best Non Fiction Piece for her deeply personal article, ‘Don’t touch my hair’. Read Hilary's reflections on her prize, a masterclass with Dr Simon Heffer and Dr Glenda Cooper >>> https://t.co/yp1d2jvSVf https://t.co/lUrWh1WZiX