2026 WA Young Writers Award

The City of Subiaco proudly presents the 2026 WA Young Writers Award.

This new name demonstrates our statewide reach, celebrates 34 years of exemplary writing at Subiaco and continues to foster and celebrate young writers as we’ve always done. This award is open to WA young writers from year one to year twelve.

Entries for the 2026 WA Young Writers Award have now closed, thank you to all who entered.

Entries are open to Western Australian school students in years one to twelve. Entries are to be the sole work of the entrant and are limited to one per person. Entries are to be no more than 2000 words in length and there is no theme for the award.

2026 winners announced

Overall Winner
Aiden	Chin	Year 6	Four Words
Lower Primary
First place	Sarah	Hobby	Year 2	The Keys of Two Treasures
Second place	Jake	Leon	Year 2	The Famous Ferrari Racer
Third place	Nia	Baguley	Year 1	The centipede
Middle Primary
First place	Sophie	Colalillo	Year 3	The Night Underwater Orchestra
Second place	Hans	Teo	Year 3	An Old Tale
Third place	Evin	Anandagoda	Year 3	The Tale of Leo and Vefir
Upper Primary
First place	Aiden	Chin	Year 6	Four Words
Second place	Levi	Graham	Year 6	Hidden Trust
Third place	Dana	Hislop	Year 5	Osprey's Bad Temper
Lower Secondary
First place	Lizetienne	Burke-Hardy	Year 9	The Medium of Flesh
First place	Nethuli	Somarathna	Year 8	This Place Is For Kids
Second place	Scarlett	Brown	Year 8	The Bin Run
Upper Secondary
First place	Diya	Sanjay	Year 11	The Song of the Uraad Dhal
First place	Shamaita	Ray	Year 11	Lyrebird
Second place	Mia	Saranovic	Year 11	english assignment draft
Third place	Hannah	Nguyen	Year 10	Birds of a Feather

Name	Entry title	School year
Phoebe McKean	Neko	Year 5
Laura Bishop	The Climb	Year 5
Scarlett Cargill	The Crown of Ashes	Year 6
Priyanka Paudel	The Reflection	Year 6
Eleanor Levy	The Lost Princess	Year 6
Milla Buck	The Summer Bear	Year 6
Cathie Jiang	Letting Go	Year 6
Charlotte Rhodes	Never Forget You	Year 6
Martin Zhang	Resonance	Year 6
Jacob Obiles	The Fig	Year 6
Fina Loro	Alfonso DeZeuss	Year 6
Sophie Widjaja	A Web of Fire and Lies	Year 9
Abigail Koh	Quickening Dawn	Year 9
Edith Setzinger	Hospital Vending Machine	Year 8
Liesl Ho	The Things We Remember	Year 8
Frieda Williams	Trees Have Two Lives	Year 10
Annemarie Dyzel	The Sound of the Garden	Year 10
Anu Sathe	Morning	Year 11
Teo Prince	Torn Apart, Same Bowl	Year 11
Finn Westcott	Ready or Not	Year 11
Eleanor Kerr	It's Eatin' Ya	Year 11
Yujin Bae	Operation Bloom	Year 11
Emilia Cuske	The Avatar Identity	Year 11
Emily Natalina Rafala	The Last Passenger	Year 10

Entries are judged individually in the following school year categories:

Lower primary – school years one and two
Middle primary – school years three and four
Upper primary – school years five and six
Lower secondary – school years seven, eight and nine
Upper secondary – school years ten, eleven and twelve

Entries are judged on the originality of the themes, the development of the story and the quality (not quantity) of the writing.

Please note: due to the high number of entries received for this award each year, individual feedback cannot be provided.

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