Librarians and Teachers, Thank you for considering this National Schools Project. For the past thirty-one years, schools across the nation have been invited to participate in this project. The National Schools Project is committed to working with teachers and librarians throughout the United States. Each participating school receives a free copy of the book and has the possibility of winning a $100 award for the most student poems accepted. Your school may be one of the schools receiving awards for the most accepted submissions. Here is the list of the 10 schools that recently received awards. Student security and privacy are our greatest concerns and ones that we have successfully addressed over the thirty-one years of the project. Student information is not disclosed to any outside party nor is the student’s name published with any information that may connect him/her to their school, address or locality. Individual student information is destroyed upon publication of the book. Poetry can be submitted online or through the mail. Please refer to the poetry submission guidelines for the information required for each submission.
Submission Deadlines 2026
Alabama-Arkansas schools: Friday, March 27, 2026
California schools: Friday, April 3, 2026
Colorado-Illinois schools: Friday, April 10, 2026
Indiana-Michigan: Friday, April 17, 2026
Minnesota-New York schools: Friday, March 13, 2026
North Carolina-Texas: Friday, March 20, 2026
Utah-Wyoming schools: Friday, March 27, 2026
Submission Guidelines
Poems should be no more than 80 words in length.
Submissions may be handwritten or typed.
There is NO LIMIT on the number of submissions from each teacher or librarian.
A student may submit multiple poems, but each student is limited to one page of poetry.