Last week, one high school teacher, one high school student, and three undergraduate students received 2014 Norman Mailer Writing Awards from the Norman Mailer Center and Writers Colony and the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE). The awards, established to honor writer Normal Mailer’s work, recognize emerging writers who participate in public discourse, “much in the same way Norman did,” said Lawrence Schiller, president and co-founder of the Norman Mailer Center and Writing Colony, in a statement.

Winners include Andrew Jones of Hinsdale Central High School in Hinsdale, Illinois, who received the National Middle and High School Teacher Nonfiction Writing Award ($5,000 prize); Sarah Esther Maslin of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, who received the National Four Year College Nonfiction Writing Award ($5,000); Connor Rystedt of Anoka Ramsey Community College in Cool Rapids, Minnesota, who received the National Two Year College Nonfiction Writing Award; Angela Qian of the University of Chicago who received the College Poetry Award ($2,500); and Henry Holt of Northfield Mt. Herman School in Gill, Massachusetts, who received the National High School Nonfiction Writing Award ($2,500). All had submitted essays and manuscripts for consideration. Check out the full list, which includes semifinalists for each award. The guidelines for each award can be found at NCTE.org.

This year’s winners will receive their cash prizes and be honored on October 27, 2014 at the Sixth Annual Benefit Gala at the New York Public Library in New York City. Proceeds from the gala will go toward the Center’s programming and future fellowships for developing writers.