The four sets of Panellists engaging in the Press Service International young writer program have now concluded marking the first three Cycles in determining the 2016 Basil Sellers Award.
There are two Cycles (each of 5 weeks remaining) in the young writer program "marking period" - which in total is half the year.
Initiated in 2009 with five sports writers for daily columns in Christian Today, the young writer program broadened to include Comment writers, along with writers on Life, Society, Music, IT, Entertainment, Theology, Philosophy, and the like.
The $1000 Basil Sellers Young Writer Award was initiated in 2013 at the Melbourne conference determined by a group of Australian and New Zealand Panellists with Australian and New Zealand separate awards.
This was repeated in 2014 and 2015 and the 2016 'awards' will be presented at the annual young writer conference on 13 August in Sydney.
Previous Basil Sellers winners
Australia
2013 – Alison Barkley
2014 – Danielle Carney-Stott
2015 – Belinda Croft
New Zealand
2013 – Daniel Jang
2014 – Casey Murray
2015 – Sophia Sinclair and Jeremy Suisted
There are also $500 'Consistency' awards. There will be numbers of non-financial awards in 2016 as there were in 2015. These are important recognition awards including the Sport Writer's award.
Australia
Consistency
2013 - Laura Veloso
2014 – Sarah Young
2015 – Jeremy Dover, Charlotte Goiris, Rebecca Moore
New Zealand
Consistency
2013 – Casey Murray, Sophia Sinclair
2014 – Sophia Sinclair
2015 – Tim Newman and Brad Mills
Theological – in 2016 Faith and Context
2013 – Sam Burrows
2014 – Jeremy Suisted
2015 – Sam Manchester and Andrew Sinclair
The Panellists
These are the 2016 Panellists who keep the ball rolling for the Basil Sellers Award. They mark their respective young writer articles throughout each of the first 5 Cycles.
Australia
Gavin Lawrie
John Skinner
Deidre Tronson
Aira Chilcott
Vicki Nunn
Eric Polis
New Zealand
Brian Carrell
Liz Hay
Tash McGill
Deidre Tronson
Peter Rope
Brent Costley
International
Nathanael Yates
Daniel Stott
Euan McDonald
Vic Matthews
Sophia Sinclair
Deidre Tronson
Sport
Peter Nelson
Simon Farrer
Andrew Bennett
David Burr
Tim Wilson
These are the dedicated people engaging in the concentrated effort to ascertain the 2016 annual 'Basil Sellers' young writer awards. This is really quite special and humbly remarkable in the service of the Lord.
Dr Mark Tronson is a Baptist minister (retired) who served as the Australian cricket team chaplain for 17 years (2000 ret) and established Life After Cricket in 2001. He was recognised by the Olympic Ministry Medal in 2009 presented by Carl Lewis Olympian of the Century. He mentors young writers and has written 24 books, and enjoys writing. He is married to Delma, with four adult children and grand-children.
Mark Tronson's archive of articles can be viewed at http://www.pressserviceinternational.org/mark-tronson.html