This is the time of year when work begins in earnest on The Student Gazette, a special publication we print in May featuring the winners of our annual writing and photography contest.

We get hundreds of entries each year for The Student Gazette, which will be published as part of The Daily Gazette this coming May 14. Once we select the winners, we invite them all down to the newsroom for an awards ceremony and to have their photos taken for a group photo we'll run in The Student Gazette.

Contest categories include opinion writing, sports writing and news/features writing. We have a separate category for photos and another for cartoons. And we judge the entries by grade division: 3-6, 7-9 and 10-12.

Our advertising department also has a contest in which students design the ads that run in the publication.

There are prizes, including $100 cash for the top winner in all of the categories.

If you'd like more information, email me at jpatrick@dailygazette.net.