Prepare and submit a nomination

Follow these steps to ensure your nomination is valid and that you can receive updates about your submission:

  1. make sure to read the eligibility criteria and closing date for the honour or award
  2. have all the correct, required information to complete your submission ready, including:
    • names
    • email addresses
    • home/office addresses
    • phone numbers
    • other contact details for accuracy
    • description of the nominee’s impact to show how and where they have made a difference
    • writing samples, testimonial letters and additional resources
  3. create or sign in to your My Ontario.ca account and select the honour or award program
  4. enter all the required information
  5. make sure the information is entered into the correct fields for the nominator (the person making the submission) and for the nominee (the person being recommended for the honour or award)
  6. review the full submission for spelling and typing errors
  7. submit only one submission per nominee per award category

Tips for writing nominee descriptions

Most honours and awards programs require you to enter a summary about the nominee and/or a description of their specific contributions to Ontario. It is important to clearly explain and include evidence of why your nominee is eligible and deserves to be recognized.

Show how they:

  • impact other individuals or their community
  • encourage and represent good citizenship
  • touch and enrich the lives of others
  • display ongoing initiative, leadership and dedication
  • devote themselves to volunteering
  • are role models in their field
  • are innovative in their field
  • provide unique contributions to the creative arts and literacy

Your detailed description should:

  • be clear
  • provide specific examples of your nominee’s contributions to Ontario
  • connect to criteria and align with the honour or award’s purpose
  • show how and where your nominee has made a difference

Your detailed description should not be:

  • an extended resume
  • a list of educational achievements or transcripts
  • a list of appointments, awards or posts
  • a job description showing what the person has been hired to do

Description examples

Here are some well-written excerpts of past nominations:

Helping his community

This nominee took the initiative to do something to help his community. He identified a need and started something from nothing, leaving a lasting impact on his peers, school and community.

He organized the Student Activist Association to reach out to other newcomer students and his desire was to give an opportunity to newcomer students to experience community engagement in Canada to gain their self-esteem and confidence. I was impressed by his altruism in promoting social justice issues in a broader level and engage many newcomer students who are marginalized in the school. I consider this initiative as a tangible step where he created a framework and a forum for marginalized students to get involved and it has a lasting impact. This is very important since our school is home to a diverse student population.

Enrich the lives of newcomers

This nominee touched and enriched the lives of newcomers. Her initiatives had lasting results and impacted thousands of people in her community.

Her roots run deep as a newcomer who fled Honduras after her husband’s disappearance, torture and murder. From this tumultuous beginning as a refugee in Canada, she has made a commitment to ease the transition for newcomers to Canada. Her 21-year tenure at the health centre has afforded much success in welcoming, supporting, advocating, and mentoring new arrivals to Canada. She spearheaded the Multicultural Health Department at the health centre, when there was no avenue for newcomers to access primary care. Her department provided cultural interpretation services and peer support to newcomers from several countries looking to settle in her area. Over the years, her work has contributed to the successful transition of thousands of families and individuals.

Excellence in her field of work

This nominee has achieved excellence in her field of work and made noticeable changes to the Canadian literary landscape. She has broken barriers, became a role model and mentor and enriched the lives of many generations of Canadian and international writers.

She has subtly and effectively altered the face of Canadian literary culture over a period of 59 years. First, she was a potent force in fostering the study of Canadian literature in high school and university courses during the late 50s and early 60s, before it was regarded an acceptable field for serious study. Second, in 1975, she co-founded an academic journal which established Canadian criticism of Canadian children’s authors, helping this fledging field develop. Third, she has changed how we read early Canadian women writers – especially L.M. Montgomery, who is now seen, thanks to [the nominee’s] work, as a powerful international influence. Finally, she has served as a role model and mentor for several generations of Canadian women who aspired to professional careers. There is no question that she has made a huge difference in many aspects of what now constitutes Canadian “literary history”, as well as in broader aspects of Canadian culture. She has always been Ontario based, but her work ranged far beyond.

Tips for writing testimonial letters

Many honours and awards programs require testimonial letters to provide a full understanding of the nominee. A testimonial can be written by anybody, they do not need to be written by an influential or high-profile person.

It is important that testimonials:

  • are each written by different people, and that they speak to the nominee’s achievement(s) and/or contribution from first-hand experience
  • are current and specific for the honour or award
  • are more than a simple statement that you support the nomination
  • provide examples of the nominees’ impact from different perspectives
  • explain the value and impact of the nominee’s achievements

The testimonials should:

  • include the testimonial writer’s first name, last name, email address and phone number
  • indicate how the writer knows the nominee
  • support the nomination

Testimonial examples

Here are some excerpts of past testimonials written about the same nominee:

A parent wrote:

I was quite impressed by her maturity and dedication at the tender age of eleven. She is now 17, still visits us on a regular basis and has [organized] numerous fundraising events for the CNIB on behalf of our daughter.

A teacher wrote:

I have never, in 36 years of teaching, encountered a young person so prepared to immediately assume a leadership role when a need arises.

A fellow student and friend wrote:

She has truly inspired me to become more involved in the community, reach out to those who are not as privileged as ourselves, and share our talents with those around us in order to make a positive change in our community and our world. I am merely one of the many lives that she has influenced throughout her daily life.