London, Desh Desk, 21st November 2022: On Thursday 17th November, Her Majesty The Queen Consort held a reception for winners of The Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition 2022 at Buckingham Palace, London.

The reception was attended by 2022 competition winners and their families, three previous competition winners from 2020 and 2021 who were not able to attend an awards ceremony previously due to Covid restrictions, final panel judges and notable literary figures from across the Commonwealth.

During the Award Ceremony, the winners, who are aged between 13-17 years old and travelled from New Zealand, Australia, India and the UK, were awarded their certificates by The Queen Consort. Extracts from their winning pieces were read by RCS Ambassadors Geri Horner, Alexandra Burke and Ayesha Dharker, as well as Booker Prize winner Ben Okri.

RCS Ambassador Gyles Brandreth acted as compère for the ceremony, during which The Queen Consort and the RCS Executive Chair, Dr Linda Yueh, spoke about the importance of the competition to elevate the voices of young people around the Commonwealth. The Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition is the world’s oldest international school writing competition. It was founded in 1883 by the Royal Commonwealth Society, who has proudly delivered the competition for nearly 140 years, to promote literacy, expression, and creativity among young people throughout the Commonwealth and help nations achieve UN SDG 4 (Quality Education).

For this year’s competition, 150 volunteer judges, drawn from across the Commonwealth, assessed the entries on the theme, Our Commonwealth, and the final judging decision was taken by an expert panel, which included bestselling author Dame Susan Hill DBE; 2022 Booker Prize winner, Shehan Karunatilaka; Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry 2014 winner, Imtiaz Dharker; Head of Research for the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, the Rev Dr Paul Edmondson; and 2022 Commonwealth Short Story Prize winner from eSwatini, Ntsika Kota.