The Kouhi Award
 
The Kouhi Award was established by NOWW in 1999 to recognize “outstanding contributions to the literature of Northwestern Ontario.” It is named in honour of poet Elizabeth Kouhi.
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Eligibility
  • The recipient should be living when selected to receive the award.
  • Current members of the NOWW Executive are not eligible to receive this award.
  • The recipient is not required to be a NOWW member.
Nominations
  • The call for nominations should be widely publicized.
  • Nominations may be made by anyone, including non-members of NOWW and including members of the Selection Committee.
Selection Criteria and Process
  • Recipients should have a significant history of contributing to the literature of northwestern Ontario and should be evaluated on the breadth and depth of their full body of work.
  • Nominees will be respected members of the literary community and will have been recognized as such by their peers, generally through publication of works, receipt of grants, and other such achievements.
  • If the committee feels there is no worthy nominee in a given year, the Kouhi Award will not be made.
  • The recipient will be informed in advance of the award, but asked to keep the matter secret. This allows the recipient to prepare a response after receiving the Kouhi Award at the annual Literary Awards Party, while preserving the secrecy of the award until its announcement.
  • Recipients may receive this Award once.
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Previous Recipients
The first recipient of the Kouhi Award was Elizabeth Kouhi. Since then, Elinor Barr, Charles Wilkins, the Thunder Bay Writers Guild, Rosalind Maki, Penny Petrone, Mary Frost, Jean E. Pendziwol, Dorothy Colby, Joan Skelton, Hazel Fulford, Bill MacDonald, Sharon Irvine, John Pringle, Richard Wagamese, Michael Christie,Joan M. Baril  and Ruby Slipperjack have been honoured.
NOWW offers several awards intended to recognize achievement in the field of literature and writing in Northwestern Ontario–the Kouhi Award and the Margaret Phillips Award.
Nominations for each of these awards open in January of each year. The awards are presented at the annual Literary Awards Party. To submit a nomination, send a brief (two pages maximum) statement describing why the person or organization you’re nominating deserves the award to admin@nowwwriters.ca.
 
The Margaret Phillips Award (Previously the Burnford Award)
 
This Award was first established in 2009 to recognize a “builder,” either a group or individual who has made outstanding contributions to publishing, promoting, or supporting the literature of Northwestern Ontario. The intent is to recognize those who support the practice and community of writing, as distinct from the Kouhi Award which recognizes writers.
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Eligibility
  • If the nominee is an organization, the organization should be active at the time of selection. If the nominee is an individual, the recipient should be living at the time of selection.
  • Current members of the NOWW Executive are not eligible to receive the award.
  • Past NOWW members who are nominated must had made important contributions to the service of literature and writing in Northwestern Ontario beyond their years of service on the NOWW Board. 
  • The recipient does not need to be a NOWW member or affiliated with NOWW.
  • Recipients, whether an individual or organization, may receive this Award once.
Nominations
  • The call for nominations should be widely publicized.
  • Nominations may be made by anyone, including non-members of NOWW and including members of the Selection Committee.
Selection Criteria and Process
  • Nominees will be judged on their specific and important contributions in the service of literature and writing in Northwestern Ontario, or continuing and ongoing support of the literary community of the region.
  • If the Selection Committee feels there is no worthy nominee in a given year, the award will not be made.
  • The recipient, or an appropriate representative of the recipient organization, will be informed in advance of the award, but asked to keep the matter secret. This allows the recipient to prepare a response after receiving the Phillips Award at the annual Literary Awards Party, while preserving the secrecy of the award until its announcement.
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Previous Winners
The first Burnford Award was given to the Thunder Bay Public Library. The 2010 winner was the Sleeping Giant Writers Festival, the 2011 winners were Barb Matousek and Wendy MacDonald and the 2012 winners were the founders of NOWW (Deborah de Bakker, Rosalind Maki, Charles Wilkins and Jim Foulds). .
 
2016 marked the first year of the renamed Margaret Phillips award.

​ The 2020 Nominations for the  Kouhi and Margaret Phillips Awards
are now open.

Deadline for nominations is:  March 31, 2021 @ midnight
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Put KP Awards in the email subject line and submit to:
 admin@nowwwriters.ca