Before submission

Submission Requirements

  • You must be the sole author.
  • The essay may not have been previously published outside your school.
  • The essay may not be under consideration for publication elsewhere.
  • The essay must be written on a topic in philosophy, history, art history, literature, public policy, or sociology. Further information on the relevant disciplines is available in the FAQ.
  • We offer two submission options:
    • Submit: Accept the copyright transfer agreement, upload the essay, and pay the non-refundable submission fee.
    • Subscribe & Submit: All is the same as Submit, except you have the option of emailing your essay within the next year before your subscription expires. If you opt to submit later, email (titled ‘Submit: your first and last name’) your submission to editorial@theschola.org.
  • Regardless of the submission option, your essay must meet the requirements on this page.
    • You must submit your final document at once; do not test a file upload.
    • You are responsible for all aspects of readability in English. We don’t provide in-depth copy editing as part of the production process.

    Format Requirements

    • The essay must have the manuscript and author details on the cover; refer to the format.
    • The essay must be approximately 5,000 words (+/- 10 percent acceptable: 4,500-5,500 words, not including the abstract, footnotes and bibliography).
    • The essay must have an abstract of 200-220 words.
    • The essay must be text-only (no graphics).
    • The essay must NOT have acknowledgments thanking someone who helped with your research.
    • The essay must adopt the Oxford referencing style, which has two components. 1) A superscript number is inserted in your text at the point where you refer to (cite) your source of information. This superscript number then appears at the bottom of the page where the footnote is recorded. 2) The full details for each citation or reference, the bibliography, are then listed at the end of the essay. References are listed in alphabetical order by author’s surname.
    • The essay must use a ‘standard’ font, preferably 12-point Times New Roman.
    • The name of your essay file must be your first and last name.
    • The essay file must be in MS Word format.