5+ Writing Opportunities for Teens

Today I'm excited to share with you 5 writing opportunities for teenagers and young adults, and these are just the beginning!

I love teenagers. I have three of my own right now plus a 12-year-old and a 20-year-old. I also love writing and have enjoyed doing it ever since I could write. 

Then I realized sometime in my 30s that journal entries, vents, and complaints can turn into magazine articles (and reprints!), short stories, print books, ebooks, PDF downloads, speaking engagements, and more. 

I've taught Creative Writing to a few different grades at our local homeschool co-op, and this past year, I taught English Grammar and Composition to high schoolers. You never know who might be the next Shirley Jackson, Fredrik Backman, Stephen King, or Emily St. John Mandel! There were some kids in there with serious talent, and I promised them I'd get out a downloadable resource so they could start submitting (working on it this summer!).

1. The Adroit Journal 

(high school and up)

From the website: "The journal sponsors the annual Adroit Prizes for Poetry and Prose for secondary and undergraduate writers, the annual Djanikian Scholars Program for emerging student and non-student writers, and the free, online Adroit Journal Summer Mentorship Program for high school students from around the world. We’re looking for work that’s bizarre, authentic, subtle, outrageous, indefinable, raw, paradoxical. We’ve got our eyes on the horizon. Send us writing that lives just between the land and the sky."

2. OneTeen Story
(ages 13-19)
One Teen Story is looking for great short stories focused on teen protagonists and dealing with teen experiences such as issues of identity, friendship, family, coming-of-age, etc.

3. Skipping Stones

(all ages)
A magazine that celebrates ecological and cultural diversity. Published 5 times a year, they accept essays, stories, letters to the editor, riddles and proverbs, and other creative writing up to 750 words or 30 lines for a poem.

4. Teen Ink
(grades 7-12)
This website, monthly newsprint magazine, and quarterly poetry magazine features personal essays, short stories, reviews (books, CDs, concerts, movies), and interviews from young authors.

5. Teen Voices
(females, ages 13-19)
Teen Voices, the global girls’ online news site of Women's eNews, is looking for girls who are interested in journalism and media to write for its site. All girls 13-19 years old are invited to join its writing staff. Teen Voices also publishes a series by and about girls with physical disabilities, called Girl Fuse. For more information about how to get paid to write, check out the submission guidelines.

Did you know that you can write one article and sell it again for money to dozens of different magazines all over the world? And yes, the editors know we are doing this. It’s not a secret, just something that's not very well known. Check out my resource with 600 markets! (use promo code PPBLOG20 for 20% off) You can order "The Mother of All Writing Market Books" here.