The Open Call is open to residents of the UK aged 11 – 25. Those under 18 can only enter with the explicit permission from their parent/guardian (aged 18 or over).
Employees or contractors of English Heritage or TORCH (The Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities), our Partner on this project, or any person directly or indirectly involved in the running of the Open Call, or their direct family members are not eligible for the award.
There is no entry fee and no purchase necessary to enter the Open Call.
By submitting your work, an entrant is indicating their agreement to be bound by these terms and conditions. To enter you must upload your work in the following acceptable formats: pdf, doc, docx, txt, mp3, mp4, MOV, JPEG, JPG, PNG. You must upload your work via the online form linked on the Inspiring Voices webpage section of the English Heritage website (https://www.englishheritage.org.uk/learn/inspiring-voices/). You must also fill out all required information boxes and confirm parental/legal guardian permission if under 18.
It is the responsibility of each entrant to ensure that their entries have been submitted with the consent of anyone who is identifiable in that entry or the consent of their parent/guardian if they are under 18 years and that they have been advised of the purpose of the submission and that their image may be published by English Heritage and TORCH.
The selected top entries will be contacted via email to the email address provided.
Entries submitted in any other way will not be accepted.
Entries which we deem to be obscene, biased or inappropriate will not be accepted, and English Heritage reserves the right to reject any entries for any reason at its sole discretion.
All entries must be the sole work of the entrant. It is the responsibility of each entrant to ensure that the work submitted or anything within the work does not infringe on the copyright of any third parties, and to indemnify English Heritage and TORCH against any claims made by third parties in the event of such an infringement.
Entrants shall maintain their moral and legal rights in their entry, but shall consent to English Heritage, Shout Out Loud, and TORCH using, copying, modifying, adapting and publicly displaying their entry on any English Heritage owned, TORCH owned or third-party website, print, social media and/or any other media for publicity purposes. The parents or legal guardians of any winning entrants under the age of 18 years must complete a Consent Form consenting to the use of the entrant’s entry and name for publicity purposes on any website, print and social media and any other media.
One entry will be accepted per person. Your work may be applicable to more than one category.
If submitting a film or audio file, they should be no more than 3 minutes in length, and no larger than 50mb (if your file size is larger, please compress the file to 50mb so that we can download the file).
English Heritage reserves the right to cancel or amend the Open Call at any stage, if deemed necessary in its opinion, and if circumstances arise outside of its control. Any changes will be notified to entrants as soon as possible by the Promoters.
English Heritage is not responsible for inaccurate award details supplied to any entrant by any third party connected with this Open Call.
The Open Call winners will be chosen by a panel of judges appointed by English Heritage and TORCH.
The judges’ decision is final, and no correspondence will be entered into.
The winners will be notified in May 2026. If a winner cannot be contacted or does not claim their award within 14 days of notification, English Heritage reserves the right to withdraw the award from that winner and pick a replacement winner.
English Heritage reserves the right to substitute any award (as detailed below) for one of equal or greater value. English Heritage reserves the right to withhold, change or cancel the award in the event of non-compliance with these rules.
The awards are as stated, and no cash or other alternatives will be offered. The awards are not transferable.
By submitting their work, entrants are agreeing that any personal information provided with the entry may be held and used by English Heritage, TORCH or their agents and suppliers to administer the Open Call and the awards. All personal data provided to English Heritage and TORCH will be held and processed in accordance with the requirements of all legislation and regulatory requirements in force from time to time relating to the use of personal data and the privacy of electronic communications, including (i) the Data Protection Act 2018 and any successor UK legislation, as well as (ii) the UK GDPR; and (iii) the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003 (SI 2003/2426) as amended. English Heritage and TORCH will keep the entrant’s personal data safe and secure. English Heritage and TORCH will not share it with other organisations without the entrant’s knowledge and consent, unless required by law to do so. English Heritage and TORCH will keep the entrant’s personal data only for the purposes of communicating with the entrant regarding the Open Call. The entrant shall have the right to withdraw their consent at any time. The withdrawal of consent shall not affect the lawfulness of processing based on consent before its withdrawal.
The Open Call and these terms and conditions will be governed by English law and any disputes will be subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of England.
This promotion is in no way sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with X, Facebook, Instagram or any other Social Network. You are providing your information to English Heritage and not to any other party – details and entries will be shared with TORCH, our Partner on this project. The information provided will be used in conjunction with the following Privacy Policy found at: https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/about-us/our-people/our-policies/. English Heritage shall have the right, at its sole discretion and at any time, to change or modify these terms and conditions, such change shall be effective immediately upon posting to this webpage.
Awards
English Heritage and TORCH are delighted to be supporting creative youth talent through this project.
A selection of young poets who submit their work will be in with a chance of receiving a special opportunity or reward from both organisations.
Learn more below:
Winners in the 11-14 Category, 15-17 Category and 18-25 Category will receive:
• Invitation to attend and perform their piece at the Schwarzman centre in Oxford in June 2026. Travel and accommodation costs covered for winner and one other (must be an adult if entrant is under 18).
• English Heritage Membership for 1 year
• Collection of Literary works
• Branded poetry anthology containing their creative response
• Certificate
• Other prizes that are to be determined.
Runners-up across all categories will receive a certificate and selection of prizes.
Those marked as Highly Commended will receive a certificate.
Judges Work will be selected by a panel consisting of five-six representatives including a young person from English Heritage’s Shout Out Loud programme, professional poets from TORCH, and representatives from English Heritage.