Hi Andrea,
I think some type of a voting system (wrapped in a periodical contest or otherwise) to highlight the newcomers would be a great addition to Steemit. Not only it would benefit the newcomers but I also feel that it would be an opportunity to find really interesting content here on Steemit.
Trending/Hot/etc. works well for pulling content based on data, but what if we could vote for content? That's an interesting idea, and I think you should explore it further. You never know what might come out of this! Go for it.