US Department of State announced the ?Doors to Diplomacy International Competition?.

It is aimed to encourage middle school and high school students around the world to produce web projects that teach others about the importance of international affairs and diplomacy.

Each student team member of the winning ?Doors to Diplomacy? Award team will receive a US$2,000 scholarship, and the winning coaches? schools each will receive a US$500 cash award.

The State Department will sponsor a trip to Washington, DC, where the winners will receive a private tour of the State Department facilities, meet key officials and participate in a special award presentation ceremony.

In the framework of the project, small teams are formed consisting of two to four student members and up to two adult \"coaches\". Research can be conducted both online and offline, and then the findings will be assembled to produce an educational web project. Students are also encouraged to become spokespersons for their projects.

Each ?Doors to Diplomacy? project also includes a project narrative that explains how the project has been organized, what challenges had to be overcome and how the project supported local content standards. Many wonderful community building success stories often emerge from these \"behind the scenes\" narratives. The projects and narratives are due 20 March 2005.

As part of the competition, teams must also participate in a Peer Review activity, in which they will evaluate at least four other projects, using a web-based evaluation rubric.

This assignment in the framework of the competition will be due 16 April 2005.

To participate, students should register online at http://globalschoolhouse.org/GSH/doors/.