We are delighted to announce the 2025 edition of our annual essay prize. We run parallel prizes for secondary school pupils and undergraduate university students, both of which are judged by a prestigious expert panel.
Submissions are typically slightly adapted versions of assignments or essays already written over the course of the school/academic year.
The winners of each prize are sent a £50 book voucher and are invited to publish their essays on the SES blog. Read previous winning submissions here.
Deadline and Submission
Submit to fraser.mcmillan@ed.ac.uk by the revised deadline of Friday 31st of October (23:59) with subject line “SES Essay Prize”.
Judging Panel
Our excellent panel will judge both prizes this year. All three judges are established expert observers of Scottish politics, polling and public opinion.
– Abigail Axe-Browne, Research Manager, YouGov
– Simeon Kerr, Scotland Correspondent, Financial Times
– Alan Convery, Senior Lecturer in Politics, University of Edinburgh
Essay Guidelines
Secondary Schools
1,500 words maximum discussing Scottish politics. This includes voting, elections and referendums, political parties or democratic reform.
Undergraduates
3,000 words maximum analysing voting in Scotland, the UK as a whole or its other nations and territories. This includes Westminster, devolved or local elections or referendums. The essay must make use of data derived from the Scottish Election Study, the Welsh Election Study, the Northern Ireland Assembly Election Study, the British Election Study, the Scottish Social Attitudes Survey or a similar source of information about public opinion.