Light Up Your Spirit of Innovation Challenge

Start-ups bring changes and solutions from the ground up to meet modern-day sustainability challenges as well as the needs of our own community.

Autor*in Louisa Wong -, 08.07.14

Start-ups bring changes and solutions from the ground up to meet modern-day sustainability challenges as well as the needs of our own community. Conrad Foundation gives young people a chance every year to create commercially viable products or services to address issues of global sustainability in the fields of energy and environment, and how to use cyber technology to predict natural disasters.

The Conrad Spirit of Innovation Challenge (Conrad Challenge) is an annual challenge initiated and supported by a foundation founded by Nancy Conrad for her astronaut husband, Charles Pete Conrad Jr. It’s an annual competition for youth aged between 13-18 and sees about 19-25 secondary and post-secondary students team up to develop solutions to current problems. The challenges fall into four categories: Aerospace and Aviation, Energy and Environment, Cyber Technology and Security, and Health and Nutrition.

Teams go in the running to win a prize package that includes seed fund grants for their projects, investment opportunities, patent support, business services, and scholarships. Students are encouraged to set up teams of two to five people and register via the website. The challenge’s online community is a place where teams can exchange ideas and receive mentorship and tips from a network of professionals as well as other students and participants can engage in a suite of mini challenges to practice their entrepreneurial skills.

A group from the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics in the US won the Cybertech and Security Award in 2013 by developing AirCOM, a personal device to detect air-quality. Their product was promoted by and marketing support from the foundation, and they received professional advice from mentors, coaches and educators to further develop the prototypes.

Team registration is open until October 2014 and students around the world are most welcome to take up the challenge.

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