Awards and Prizes
The Creative Writing Program awards a number of prizes annually to some of our most distinguished students.
Emma Howell began writing at an early age and published her first poems at 15. She took writing workshops at Portland State University, and went on to study with Martha Collins, Pamela Alexander, and David Young, among others, at Oberlin College as a creative writing major. The first time Emma went to Oberlin, she felt immediately like she was home, and knew it was the exact right place for her. She also studied literature, languages, folklore, and African dance, and was particularly influenced by her experiences in the Black Arts Workshop with Caroline Jackson-Smith. She had studied for a year in Spain, which ignited her interest in travel and languages. Emma spent six months of her sophomore year studying in Salvador do Bahia, Brasil, where she died at the age of 20. 
When Emma Howell died in 2001, her parents set up a poetry prize to be awarded yearly to an Oberlin student.
They wanted to encourage young poets, just as Emma was encouraged as a creative writing major at Oberlin. After five years of generous donations from friends and family, the fund for the prize reached the amount necessary to become an endowment.
Each year, a panel of judges—members of the Creative Writing Program and Emma’s father, the poet Christopher Howell—reviews submissions from Oberlin students and awards a prize of $1,000 to the winner. Each April, the program hosts a reading of the finalists for this prize.
Recent Recipients
2021
Winners: Elmo Tumbokon and Jamie Weil
Honorable Mentions: Olivia Guerriero and Mina Ono
2020
Winner: Sheng Kao
Honorable Mention: Molly Bryson
2019
Winner: Megan Robinson
Honorable Mentions: Olivia Guerriero, Casey Redcay, Otto Vock, and Hanne Williams-Baron
2018
Winners: Leah Barber and Julian Meltzer
Honorable Mentions: Ira Berkley, Justin Jimenez, Gillian Pasley, and Clara Weinstein
2017
Winner: Margaret Saigh
2016
Winner: Dana Fang
Honorable Mentions: Orly Vermes, Maxime Berclaz, Brielle Hutchison, and Madeleine Dorner