Sikh Coalition Announces 2006 Winners of the Annual Diversity Essay Competition, Nearly 1700 Participate

News Date: 08/30/06
News Source: Sikh Coalition


The Sikh Coalition is proud to announce the winners of the Diversity Essay Competition for the year 2006. Nearly 1700 submissions were submitted from 30 Countries in the Second Annual Sikh Coalition Diversity Essay Competition. An independent jury was appointed to choose the best essays on the basis of originality, understanding of the issues involved and relevance to the theme of the essay.

The Sikh Coalition Diversity Essay Competition helps students, teachers, parents and entire communities engage in a dialogue about issues affecting our everyday lives. It provides an opportunity to learn about various religions, ethnicities, communities and celebrate the rich diversity of opinion that exists in our world.

This year we invited young people of all backgrounds to share their views on the following topic:

Racial, ethnic or religious profiling makes the world more secure.

They were asked to argue for or against this position by using suitable material collected through interviews, publications and the like.

The following awards were declared for the competition:

First Place: Nicholas Robillard (Silverdale, WA, USA) - $1,000 award.

Nicholas Robillard

Second Place: Karim A. Hassanein (Thousand Oaks, CA, USA) - $500 award.

Karim A. Hassanein

Third Place: Issac Podyma (Bedford, VA, USA) - $250 award

Issac Podyma

Honorable Mentions: Katie Schmidt (Shaw Island, WA, USA), Benjamin Landau-Beispiel (Philadelphia, PA, USA), Danielle Drasin (Beverly Hills, CA, USA), Mary Yanik (Emporia, KS, USA), Kelsey Hayes (Lawrence, KS, USA), Daniel Baker(Fountain Hill, AZ, USA), Shawnbir Singh Gogia (Fair Oaks, CA, USA), Nicholas Reshetnikov (Melbourne, FL, USA), Samantha Rene Johnson (North Chicago, IL, USA), Dildeep Brar (Ottawa, ON, Canada), Tanisia Morris (Bronx, NY, USA) - $50 award for each winner in this category.

The Education Director of the Sikh Coalition, Jasmit Singh, thanked all participants in the essay competition, “I am pleased with the exceptional quality of the essays and the breadth of participation (students essays from over 30 countries). This underscores the growing interest in the issues of diversity the world over and a fresh understanding of its vital role in our daily lives as well as the welfare of society as a whole.”

“I found it refreshing to read the thoughts of so many young people. It lifts my spirits to know that so many of them are interested in what is going on in the world around us, and can write with clarity of thought, _expression and conviction. All of them deserve to be winners!” said Parminder Singh – one of the judges of the essay competition.

The Sikh Coalition would like to thank the following individuals and distinguished judges who worked tirelessly to evaluate the essays and come up with the final results – Paramjit Singh Chawla, Sutinder Kaur Chawla, Parminder Singh, Manjit Kaur Kochhar, Paul Gamble, Dr. I J Singh, Joginder Singh Rekhi, Laurie Bolger, Dr. Nicole Carney, Dr. Sorena Kaur, Dr. Molina Kaur, Heather Singleton, Reshma Singh, Sarabjit Singh, Jaskaran Kaur, Rajwinder Singh, Hardeep Singh and Tripat Singh. Without their dedication and support, it would have been very difficult to find the winners of this competition.

The Sikh Coalition Diversity Essay Competition is open to the youth, regardless of their ethnicity, race, religion or cultural background, with an interest in religion, liberty, and a just society of free and responsible individuals.

The winning essays, including those of the honorable mentions, are available on the Sikh Coalition’s Web site, www.sikhcoalition.org/essay.asp