Shmoop Announces Fall 2010 High School Essay Contest, Aims to Turn a Student into a School Hero: Free Shmoop VIP Pass for Winner

Online, September 24, 2010 (Newswire.com) - Mountain View, Calif.- Shmoop, a digital curriculum company that makes fun, rigorous learning and teaching materials, today announced its Fall 2010 Shmoop High School Essay Contest.

Grand Prize: Win an iPad & Become a School Hero

For the Winner: an iPad 3G

For the Winner's Entire School: 1 year free Shmoop VIP Pass, which includes:
• Shmoop SAT Prep
• Shmoop PSAT Prep
• Shmoop AP Exam Prep
• Shmoop Teacher Resources

Contest Rules & How to Enter: http://www.shmoop.com/essay-contest/

The Topic: Potentially insane narrators in two works by Edgar Allan Poe

The Prompt: Answer this question in 500 or fewer words:

The narrator of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart" wants us to know that he is not "mad," but can we believe him? In fact, how about the speaker in "The Raven"? He seems a little bit on edge, too, doesn't he? We want you to decide, based on what you read in the poem and the story, whether these men are crazy or not. But we don't just want a snap judgment - this is serious business. Go over these works like a detective, and give us hard evidence. We want you to point to specific moments in the story, and use them to tell us whether these two guys are nuts. Or maybe one of them is and not the other? Or neither of them? If they aren't crazy, what's going on here?

Entry Deadline: 11:59pm Pacific Time, Oct. 31, 2010

Halloween. Just before the clock strikes midnight. Mr. Poe wouldn't have it any other way.

Meet the Final Round Judge: Esther Wojcicki is a Special Advisor to Shmoop. She teaches English and Journalism at Palo Alto (CA) High School, where she is known to students as "Woj". Wojcicki is Chairwoman of Creative Commons and a contributor to the Huffington Post. She was named 2002 California teacher of the year.