Submission Guidelines
Bradford Writes publishes student work completed in first-year composition courses at Pitt-Bradford. We are currently releasing two issues per year, with submission deadlines in December for the Fall issue and May for the Spring issue. Submission forms & instructions for the Fall 2024 issue are located below. Fall 2024 submissions are due by Monday, December 20th.
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Note that your essay does NOT need to be "perfect" to get published! There's no such thing as a "perfect" paper, and our editors will work with you to polish and format your work for publication. We publish essays based on their intellectual and creative quality, above all.
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PREPARING YOUR SUBMISSION
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To limit the amount of editing needed after submission, please use this checklist to ensure that your essay/s meet the editorial expectations for the respective genre.
Please note that if your work is chosen for publication, an editor may ask you for minor revisions to meet our editorial standards. As a rule, we try to keep any revision requests to a minimum, but occasionally minor changes to formatting and style will be requested.
ALL ESSAYS
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Proofread your work carefully before submission. Polished essays tend to win out over less-polished essays.
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You do not need to include a formal header or page numbers, just your name and title. Author information is gathered on the submissions form above.
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By default, Bradford Writes! uses MLA style, but we can accept APA style submissions as well.
NARRATIVES
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Use only the first or last name of real-life people in your story, not both. For example, “Reggie” or “Mr. Washington” would be fine, but “Reggie Washington” is not. You can also choose to use pseudonyms to prevent clearly identifying a real-life person in your story. It is potentially unethical or illegal to fully identify a real-life person in a publication without their written consent.
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If your story contains graphic content, a trigger warning may be affixed to your essay upon publication. This allows us to publish your story as you wish to tell it while respecting our audiences’ individual experiences and sensibilities.
ANALYSIS, ARGUMENT, AND RESEARCH
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Ensure that all quoted or paraphrased references to outside sources are cited using MLA citation style. Minor issues will not disqualify you, but an editor may ask you to fix any issues if your essay is selected for publication.
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All essays using outside sources must also include a works cited/reference page. Bradford Writes uses MLA style, but APA submissions are also accepted.
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Avoid using overtly biased and non-credible sources. A well-written essay with questionable sources may lose out to a less-polished essay that is more thoroughly and credibly sourced.
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We welcome provocative and potentially controversial essays from all political points of view, but we will not print essays promoting hateful language, racism, or the targeting of any marginalized individual or group of individuals. We do not censor writers here, but freedom of speech does not guarantee a digital platform to share that speech.
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Please contact Matt Salvia, Editor, at msalvia@pitt.edu with any questions.