RULES

PARTICIPANTS:

The DISTCO 2012 is open for K-12 students and teachers in following categories:

1- Elementary (Students in Grades K-5),

2-Junior (Students in Grades 6-8),

3-Senior (Students in Grades 9-12),

4-Teachers.

INTERNATIONAL PARTICIPANTS:

DISTCO accepts international submissions. Please note that all international entries will be evaluated separately under “International Category”.

THE LANGUAGE OF THE STORIES:

The language of the stories must be in English. However, stories in languages other than English may be submitted under ESL/Foreign Languages category at both national and international levels. The stories submitted in languages other than English might not be evaluated if the DISTCO cannot find judges in that language.

REGISTRATION AND STORY SUBMISSIONS:

DISTCO 2012 will have two phases. PHASE I will be the main part of the contest where all students and teachers can participate with their digital stories. PHASE II, on the other hand, will  be invitational. Selected participant from PHASE I will be invited to submit additional stories for PHASE II. Please see below timeline for PHASE I for more details.

TIMELINE:

***Registration includes signing up on the official website and filling out a required survey related to digital storytelling research. Digital Story submissions include sending a consent form and submitting at least one digital story to the official website.

PHASE II: (Invitational Only)

Selected participants from PHASE I will be invited to submit additional digital stories after February 15. The submissions for PHASE II will be between March 1, 2011-March 31, 2011.

JUDGING FOR PHASE II:

The judging for PHASE II will take place between April 1, 2011 and April 15, 2011.

ANNOUNCEMENT OF WINNERS FOR PHASE II:

Winners will be announced through the official website on May 1, 2011.

PARTICIPATION REQUIREMENTS AND FEES:

There is no fee involved for participating in DISTCO 2012, however student participants are required to  register, fill out an online consent and survey  by January 27, 2012 in order for their digital story submissions to be considered and eligible for judging. No fees or consent forms are involved for teacher participants.

ELIGIBILITY AND NUMBER OF SUBMISSIONS:

Both student and teacher participants should send at least one original entry in order to be qualified for judging. Please note that categories in DISTCO are designed to accept only one entry. While student participants may send original entries up to three different categories, teacher participants may send their original entries to all available categories within the submission period. Participants submitting same Digital Story to more than one category will be disqualified.

SUBMISSION CATEGORIES:

A Digital Story can be prepared in many different subjects. However when participants submit their work to the DISTCO, they will need to select the closest category related to the topic of their Digital Story. DISTCO 2012 has following categories available for submissions:

• Art
• Cultures/ Religions
• Computers /Technology
• English Language Arts
• ESL/Foreign Languages
• Health/ Medical
• Mathematics
• Music
• Personal Stories/Personal Reflections
• Places/Travel
• Physical Education/Sports
• Pop Culture
• Science
• Social Studies

TEAM PROJECTS:

DISTCO 2012 accepts only individual work. Team projects are not allowed.

DIGITAL STORY FORMAT:

Digital Story should at least include following items:

1-An original script or a story

2-Multimedia elements such as images and sounds. Video Clips are not required.

3-A narration, preferebly a voice over by the author.

Please see Digital Storytelling Rubric on how the projects will be evaluated by Judges.

VIDEO SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS:

DISTCO 2012 recommends PhotoStory 3 for creating Digital Stories.You can Download Photo Story 3 for free if you have a genuine copy of Windows XP or Vista.

1-Video file size should not exceed 10 MB.

2-Video lengths should not be more than 6 minutes.

3-For best results, your video display size should not be less than (640×480). Please see Project Saving Instructions in PhotoStory 3 for saving your project in PhotoStory 3.

4-Video file format should be Windows Media Video (.wmv)

 Please submit your video here. When uploading your file, please be patient as longer and bigger files in size might take 2-3 minutes to upload to the system.

GENERAL REQUIREMENTS:

Digital Stories should be original work and not to be copied from any other person or person’s work.