I am a Field Notes fan. They make awesome versions of a completely ordinary product: disposable pocket size notebooks of the type that would be given out as marketing by midwest farm/feed and hardware shops in the mid to late-mid 20th century. They make books in a different style every 3 months. If you subscribe, you get the new designs each season along with surprises. This May, a surprise was, they made a final exam type 'blue book', which you may remember from some phase of school.
I went to a preppy middle/high school for some years and my earliest memory of these books is from 8th or 9th grade.
Along with the books, which are 3x better executed than any blue book I have ever seen in the wild, comes a challenge/assignment/contest:
"Using one of the enclosed Blue Books, please submit a written essay relating a notable dramatic or humorous event that happened while you were in elementary or high school." And they list grading criteria including penmanship (in all caps), which I blame for my loss.
As we used to say in architecture school, I went around the program. This is not a memorable story from whenever, but it is a good idea IMO, and when you have an idea you should follow through with it. It is below the fold, and yes I wrote this out longhand and put it in an envelope with a stamp.