{"id":8916,"date":"2026-01-29T13:40:34","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T19:40:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/philosophy\/?p=8916"},"modified":"2026-01-29T13:45:36","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T19:45:36","slug":"2026-uwm-brian-winters-undergraduate-philosophy-essay-competition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/philosophy\/2026-uwm-brian-winters-undergraduate-philosophy-essay-competition\/","title":{"rendered":"2026 51ÁÔÆæ Brian Winters Undergraduate Philosophy Essay Competition"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>The author of the best essay submitted will receive a monetary award of $2000, disbursed in fall 2026!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Eligibility:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Enrolled 51ÁÔÆæ student with declared Philosophy Major at time of submission.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Continuing student (not graduating spring 2026)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>How to apply:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Submit general scholarship application on the Panther Scholarship App by deadline (2\/22\/26)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Send essay (900-1500 words) in response to the prompt below as Word document by email to Professors Miren Boehm (<a href=\"mailto:boehmm@uwm.edu\">boehmm@uwm.edu<\/a>) and Matthew Knachel (<a href=\"mailto:knachel@uwm.edu\">knachel@uwm.edu<\/a>) by deadline (Feb. 22, 2026).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Deadline<\/strong>: February 22, 2026<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Essay topic:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The skills one develops as a philosophy major are universally applicable. Disciplined, systematic thinking; the ability to interpret texts and assess different viewpoints; facility in critically analyzing and clearly formulating arguments\u2014these skills are useful not only in tackling the most abstruse topics in metaphysics or epistemology, but also in confronting the sorts of everyday, contemporary issues that are important to every citizen in the modern world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Using these skills, write a short essay (3 &#8211; 5 double-spaced pages = 900-1500 words) responding to <strong>the following prompt:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Recently, many state governments have enacted laws or promulgated policies that appear to restrict or otherwise subject to heightened scrutiny the subject-matter taught and discussed in college classrooms. Topics such as gender-identity, racism, ethnicity, and diversity in general are now subject to various forms of governmental oversight in these states. Should state governments be able to determine the content of the curriculum in their public universities in this way, or should curricular decisions be left to the faculty of those institutions? How should we balance the prerogative of government officials to oversee publicly funded institutions, on the one hand, with values like academic freedom on the other?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Submissions will be evaluated using the following four primary criteria:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>thoroughness in articulating not only the author&#8217;s view on the issue in question, but also the most compelling version of the opposing viewpoint;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>argumentative rigor: attention to the structure of arguments on both sides, with conclusions, premises, and the relationships among them made explicit;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>clarity of presentation: the essay should be accessible to non-philosophers, non-academics\u2014any curious, reasonably well-informed person<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>the quality and degree of independent, critical and creative thinking displayed in the paper.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Further instructions:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Do not use AI in any part of the process of writing or proofing the essay.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Because the emphasis in this competition is on philosophical argument, it is not necessary or advisable to do research for this paper. The task, rather, is to consider how one might argue on each side of the question, from first principles, as it were. Or, put another way: what counts as research for this paper is the construction, analysis and evaluation of arguments on both sides of the issue. Having done that \u201cresearch\u201d, one constructs the strongest argument one can on the topic, within the scope of a paper of this size, and one defends the argument in the face of possible counterarguments. Please direct inquiries about this essay competition to William Bristow (<a href=\"mailto:bristow@uwm.edu\">bristow@uwm.edu<\/a> \u2013 Chair of Philosophy Department) or \u00c1g\u00fast Magn\u00fasson (<a href=\"mailto:magnusso@uwm.edu\">magnusso@uwm.edu<\/a> \u2013 Undergraduate Advisor for Philosophy Department).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The author of the best essay submitted will receive a monetary award of $2000, disbursed in fall 2026! Eligibility: How to apply: Essay topic: The skills one develops as a philosophy major are universally applicable. Disciplined, systematic thinking; the ability &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":38860,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","uwm_wg_additional_authors":[]},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8916","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.3 (Yoast SEO v27.3) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Philosophy<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/philosophy\/2026-uwm-brian-winters-undergraduate-philosophy-essay-competition\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"2026 51ÁÔÆæ Brian Winters Undergraduate Philosophy Essay Competition\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The author of the best essay submitted will receive a monetary award of $2000, disbursed in fall 2026! 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