Submission Policy & Guidelines
The Senior Paper is a copyright protected body of work and may not be reproduced, in whole or in part in print, digital, audio, video, or otherwise, without our prior express written permission. All submissions to The Senior Paper are subject to our Terms and Conditions.
Submission to The Senior Paper does not guarantee publishing. Photo(s) included with submitted content are published at the discretion of The Senior Paper and submitting a photo (or photos) does not guarantee publishing. The Senior Paper reserves the right to edit all stories and submissions, without exception. In some cases, only an excerpt of a submission may be published. Submissions are given consideration for print on a first-come, first-served basis.
By submitting content to The Senior Paper, you understand and accept that your submission may not be considered for publishing, or may be edited in accordance with our editing policies, and to ensure it adheres to generally accepted Canadian journalistic standards, practices, and ethics. While we endeavour to publish all material in a timely manner, due to the large volume of material received, we cannot say when (or if) submissions will be published, and we do not notify submitters prior to publishing.
Articles, stories, letters, and all other editorial content submitted for publishing consideration:
• The Senior Paper is a Canadian-focused publication. Accordingly, submissions must be from Canadian citizens or permanent residents; or must be about memories, moments, and/or events that occurred within Canada, or are about Canada.
• Your Precious Memory story submissions should be from or about specific events or memories in your own life. You are welcome to write about any event, or events, from your life, past and present, providing they adhere to our submission guidelines. If you are unsure of how to start your story, we recommend you write it as though were writing a letter to a dear friend, telling them the story.
We do not accept submissions for publishing consideration that are: fictional; written in third-person; creative writing / creative perspective or narration; chronological events, occurrences, or itinerary / list-style summary in nature, or submissions that are written as opinion or commentary.
• We welcome stories about your family, however, these stories must be about your memories and recollections of family, and not written as a tribute or homage to family members or friends. We do not accept stories written in tribute and we do not accept biographical stories.
• We do not accept articles submitted posthumously.
• Titles (referred to as headlines) for all stories published are written by our editors. We do not know the layout of a story or headline length required to fit above a story until a submission is put on a page prior to publishing. For this reason, we do not use titles supplied by contributors as headlines.
• If possible, we prefer the story to be typed, printed, or emailed, but this is not mandatory. Handwritten articles are accepted, however, the writing should be clear and legible, and names should be printed to ensure accuracy. Please keep stories to a maximum of 700 words and poems to a maximum of 400 words. Stories over 700 words may be edited for length or returned to the author for editing. Poems over 400 words will be returned.
• The following topics are considered outside the editorial direction, focus, or guidelines of The Senior Paper. As such, we do not accept submissions that:
– are a political or religious belief or ideology, commentary, or opinion;
– that many offer or describe specific health or medical treatment or advice;
– are profane or have profanity;
– are insensitive, insulting, indelicate, or hurtful, or could reasonably be interpreted by readers as insensitive, insulting, indelicate, or hurtful, toward race, ethnicity, religion, age, sex, gender, or any other recognized or protected group;
– advocate, or could be reasonably interpreted as advocating, any form of harm to humans, animals, and other sentient beings; or otherwise describes or depicts cruelty, bullying, violence, abuse, harm, or neglect to persons of any age; or otherwise describes or depicts cruelty, suffering, or abuse to animals (including, but not limited to, harm or neglect), and other sentient beings;
– could reasonably be interpreted as glorifying actions that may endanger the welfare of humans, animals, and other sentient beings.
We do not accept submissions taken from (or previously published in) other newspapers, magazines, or publications.
Photographic Memories:
Browse through your old photo album to see if you might have a picture that relates to your story. If not, perhaps there’s another interesting old photo that you have a great story about. Photographs must be of good quality to be reproduced. Please ensure all photograph(s) have information for a caption to be printed with the picture, including (from left to right) names of people in the picture, as well as where and when it was taken. Please print the information so that it is easily readable, as we do not want to misspell people’s names.
For publishing quality and aesthetic purposes, we do not accept photocopies or low quality ink-jet photos. We reserve the right to remove photo watermarks on all submitted photos whenever possible. Photo(s) included with submitted content are published at the discretion of The Senior Paper and submitting a photo (or photos) does not guarantee publishing.
We do not accept photos that have have been clipped or copied from other newspapers, magazines, or other publications.
Submission Draws:
Subscribers who submit articles or photos will be entered into our monthly draw for cash and other great prizes! The monthly draw prizes are: two (2) - $50 cash prizes, three (3) - one-year free subscriptions, and five (5) - Happy Face Pens. (One draw entry is given for each article or photo, or article/photo combination, up to a maximum of 1 entries per person, per month.) Winners are selected from qualifying entries and are notified in writing. Winners are also published in The Senior Paper.