Summer Reading Contest, Week 8: What Got Your Attention in The Times This Week?

Welcome to Week Eight of our 14th Annual Summer Reading Contest.

This contest is open to students 13-19 from anywhere in the world. To participate, submit a response by 9 a.m. Eastern on Aug. 4 that answers the questions “What got your attention in The New York Times this week? Why?”

If you are 13 or older and live in the United States, or 16 or older from anywhere else in the world, post your response in the comment section. If you are a teacher, parent or guardian of a student or child who is 13-15 and lives outside the United States, see the bottom of this post for details on how to submit.

Responses must be 1,500 characters — about 250 words — or fewer.

What should you choose? Well, as you know from the rules we’ve posted, you can pick anything published on nytimes.com in 2023, including articles, essays, videos, photos, podcasts or graphics.

So what did you read, watch or listen to this week? Maybe you were consumed by front-page headlines about the blockbuster “Barbie” opening or the change of Twitter’s logo from a bird to an X — or maybe you were more taken with stories about travel hacks, the benefits of morning meditation, the 70th anniversary of the Korean War’s end or the dearth of Latino actors in Hollywood.

We don’t care what you choose, we just want to hear why you chose it.

We hope you’ll click around nytimes.com and find your own great articles, features and multimedia. But we also know that not everyone who participates has a Times subscription. Because all links to Times content from the student features on our site are free, every week we’ll try to help by posting interesting pieces from a variety of sections.

For example, this week you may have read front-page news articles like …

Education Dept. Opens Civil Rights Inquiry Into Harvard’s Legacy Admissions

Or, maybe you discovered stories in the Style, International, Sports, Business, Magazine, Arts, U.S., Travel, Science, Health or Smarter Living sections like …

Try Tolerance in a Small Town

Don’t Call Her ‘Karen’

Restaurants Are Hostage to Social Media Influencers

With Israel, It’s Time to Start Discussing the Unmentionable

More Public Pools Could Save Thousands of Lives

Our Oppenheimer Moment: The Creation of A.I. Weapons

Israel’s Self-Inflicted Wound

Lindsey Graham and Elizabeth Warren: When It Comes to Big Tech, Enough Is Enough

A Requiem for Diet Soda

Whatever caught your eye, tell us about it.

Need more details? The contest rules are all here, and you can read the work of last year’s winners here. A quick overview, though:

• You can choose from anything published in the print paper or on nytimes.com in 2023, including videos, podcasts, graphics and photographs. (In your response, please include the URL or headline of the piece you pick.)

• We’ll post this question each Friday from today through Aug. 11, and you’ll have until the next Friday morning to respond with your picks. Then we’ll close that post and open a new one with the same question.

• We’ll choose at least one favorite answer to feature on our site each week. Winners from this week will be announced on Aug. 15.

• Feel free to participate each week, but we allow only one submission per person per week.

• The contest is open to students ages 13 to 19 from anywhere in the world. If you are 13 or older and live in the United States, or 16 or older from anywhere else in the world, post your response in the comments section. If you are a teacher, parent or guardian of a student or child who is between the ages of 13 and 15 and lives outside of the United States, then you must submit an entry on the student’s behalf using the form below. All entries from the comments section and the form below will be judged together.