The Freedom From Religion Foundation is proud to announce the 12 winners and six honorable mentions of the 2024 Kenneth L. Proulx Memorial Essay Contest for Ongoing College Students. FFRF has paid out a total of $19,400 in award money to this year’s college contest winners.
Currently enrolled college students (up to age 24) wrote on the topic of “Why is Gen Z the least religious generation?”
This contest is named for Kenneth L. Proulx, one of FFRF’s most generous benefactors, who died in 2019. The cupola at Freethought Hall, FFRF’s office in Madison, Wis., is called the “Above Us Only Sky Kenneth L. Proulx Cupola,” or “Ken’s Cupola” for short.
The $1,000 prize for sixth place in the ongoing college competition is generously endowed by actor and FFRF Lifetime Member Mr. Madison Arnold. Madison, who is 88, has given a $30,000 endowment as a living bequest, what he calls a “pre-quest.”
Essay contest winners, their ages, the colleges or universities they are attend-ing and the award amounts are listed below. (FFRF seeks to distribute essay scholarship monies to a higher number of students, so ties — such as fourth place in this contest — are not regarded in the typical tie fashion, where, in this instance, fifth place would be skipped.)
FIRST PLACE
Sylvie Leyerle, 20, University of Illinois, $3,500.
SECOND PLACE
Daksha Pillai, 18, Columbia University, $3,000.
THIRD PLACE
Elias Abadi, 22, University of Southern California, $2,500.
FOURTH PLACE (tie)
Armin Kiffmeyer, 19, University of Wisconsin, $2,000.
Luke Ortiz-Grabe, 21, Colorado College, $2,000.
FIFTH PLACE
Atira Claude, 21, Florida Atlantic University, $1,500.
SIXTH PLACE – (Mr. Madison Arnold Award)
Kayleigh Clark, 20, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, $1,000.
SEVENTH PLACE (tie)
Zoe Lilly, 21, University of Virginia, $750.
Riley Barker, 22, University of Florida, $750.
EIGHTH PLACE
Cassidy Taggart, 21, Rutgers University, $500.
NINTH PLACE
Danae Daniels, 23, University of South Carolina-Upstate, $400.
TENTH PLACE
Ta’Liyah Darden, 19, Fort Valley State University, $300.
HONORABLE MENTIONS ($200 each)
Hannah Bartoletti, 19, Penn State University.
Braelyn Caldwell, 21, Texas A&M University.
Jasper Chiguma Jr., 20, SUNY Broome Community College.
Melia Moorman, 19, University of Louisville.
Nicholas Spinetta, 23, University of Rhode Island.
Michael Whittaker, 24, South Mountain Community College.
FFRF thanks Lisa Treu for managing the details of this and FFRF’s other student essays competitions. We also would like to thank our volunteer and staff judges, including:
Don Ardell, David Chivers, Eric Evans, Richard Grimes, Tim Hatcher, Dan Kettner, Jeffrey LaVicka, Sammi Lawrence, Katya Maes, David Malcolm, Kurt Mohnsam, Chris O’Connell, Andrea Osborne, JoAnn Papich, Brooks Rimes, Sue Schuetz, Rose Mary Sheldon, PJ Slinger, Kimberly Waldron and Karen Lee Weidig.
FFRF has offered essay competitions to college students since 1979, high school students since 1994, grad students since 2010, one for students of color since 2016 and a fifth contest for law students since 2019.
