The Gunard Berry Carlson Writing Contest, which is currently accepting submissions, has been a Saint Francis fixture for more than 40 years.

The Travaligni family established the contest to honor the memory of Gunard Berry Carlson, who died at the age of 15. Barbara Travaligni was the sister of Carlson.

The Writing Contest is open to all majors and offers four different categories: fiction, creative nonfiction, essay writing, and poetry.

The Contest also includes a visual arts category for paintings, sketches, sculptures, and photography submissions.

All submissions are anonymous. According to Dr. Brennan Thomas, associate professor of English and overseer of the contest, the judges for the writing submissions represent SFU’s four schools: Health Sciences, Sciences, Business, and Arts & Letters.

The writing submissions go through three different grading levels. Each piece is given two scores, and the ones with the highest scores move on to the next level.

Prizes are awarded for first through fourth place for the writing submissions, and “the number of honorable mentions varies between 10-15% of how many entries we have total,” said Thomas.

The top-placing submissions receive cash prizes and tuition credit.

All winning and honorable-mention pieces are published in the school’s literary magazine, Tapestries.

Eric Horell, an admissions counselor, attended St. Francis from 2009-2013 and participated in the Writing Contest each year. Horell won first place all four years with mostly fiction submissions.

“It’s all about stories,” said Horell. “Telling people the story of Saint Francis.”

Information on entering the contest is posted around campus and is available from Dr. Thomas. The deadline for the Carlson Writing Contest is Feb. 26, 2016.