Apply for Youth Innovation Challenge
4 min read
Screen short from SOLVE official website
Deadline: 18 January 2022
Are you 24 and under and passionate about making a positive impact in your community and the world? If your answer is “yes!,” we want to hear about your solution.
Young people hold the empathy, power, and ingenuity to solve problems, in their communities, the world, and everywhere in between. Solv[ED] is designed to spark a sense of agency in young people aged 24 and under, encouraging, inspiring, and supporting them to become problem-solvers in their communities and the world.
Millions of children are still out of school. The negative impacts of climate change continue to accelerate and shock our natural, social, and economic systems. Economic inequality is growing within and between countries. A global pandemic is exacerbating and exposing massive health and social inequities. We need everyone to roll up their sleeves and take part in addressing these challenges, even (and especially) when we feel overwhelmed. Each one of us has a role to play. And it’s never too early to get started.
Are you age 24 and under? Whoever you are, wherever you are in the world, we want to hear from you about your solution!
The Solv[ED] Youth Innovation Challenge is an opportunity for you to submit your tech-based solution that:
- Improves learning opportunities and outcomes for learners across their lifetimes, from early childhood on
- Supports financial and economic opportunities for all
- Accelerates healthcare access and health outcomes, reducing and, ultimately, eliminating disparities in health
- Takes action to combat climate change and its impacts
- Addresses an unmet social, environmental, or economic need not covered in the four topics above.
For more information on ‘what counts as technology?’ or ideas on topics that are eligible, see our FAQs page.
Whether your solution is a concept, a product that is being prototyped, a service that is being piloted in your local community, or a fully operational nonprofit or for-profit organization, we want to hear from you.
About the funding
The 10 most promising solutions will be selected by our judges as Solv[ED] Innovators. Over $200,000 is available in prize funding to share among selected Solv[ED] Innovators. In addition to prize funding, selected Solv[ED] Innovators will receive mentorship and coaching from members of the MIT and MIT Solve community.
Who can apply?
Anyone, anywhere around the world can submit a solution to the Solv[ED] Youth Innovation Challenge if they are aged 24 and under. For full participation details, please see our Terms of Service. Whether you apply as an individual or as a team, make sure that all applicants listed in your submission are, at most, 24 years old when the challenge closes on January 18, 2022 at 11:59pm ET. There is no cost to submitting a solution. Applications must be written in English.
What topic(s) can my solution address?
The Solv[ED] Youth Innovation Challenge welcomes submissions that address one of Solve’s four pillars: Learning, Health, Sustainability and Economic Prosperity. In addition, we welcome solutions that address an unmet social, environmental, or economic need not covered in the four pillars, see more on that below.
Learning includes, but is not limited to, solutions that are:
- Supporting access to high quality educational opportunities, including individuals in rural, remote or displaced communities
- Preparing underserved people to learn skills they need for the workforce
- Enabling teachers and educators to support student and/or adult learning
Sustainability includes, but is not limited to, solutions that are:
- Reducing carbon emissions from organizations and communities, particularly through clean energy
- Helping communities adapt and build resilience to impacts of climate change such as extreme weather
- Creating goods that are renewable, repairable, reusable, and recyclable
- Promoting access to sustainable and resilient food and water sources for rural and/or urban communities
Health includes, but is not limited to, solutions that are:
- Promoting physical and mental health
- Supporting access to effective and affordable healthcare in urban or rural communities
- Enabling the prevention, detection and management of illness, emerging pandemics and health security threats
- Promoting health equity; reducing and, ultimately, eliminating disparities in health
Economic Prosperity includes, but is not limited to, solutions that are:
- Addressing the gaps in technological and digital literacy necessary to participate in a changing job market
- Creating pathways to upskill, reskill, and retrain workers, as well as connect them to the demands of employers
- Supporting access to platforms that support temporary, informal and freelance workers, helping provide stability, safety nets, and security
- Ensuring the inclusion and value of women, low-income and underserved communities in the creation of new technologies, jobs, or entire industries
- Provide tools and opportunities for equitable access to jobs, credit, and generational wealth creation for marginalized communities
If your solution does not fit into one of these categories, you will need to clearly define the problem you want to solve in your application. We encourage you to consider the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and how your solution addresses one or more of them.
You can also discover more career opportunities through the link below: Careers | Human Rights and Legal Research Centre (hrlrc.org)
About SOLVE
Solve is an initiative of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) with a mission to solve world challenges. Solve is a marketplace for social impact innovation. Through open innovation Challenges, Solve finds incredible tech-based social entrepreneurs all around the world. Solve then brings together MIT’s innovation ecosystem and a community of Members to fund and support these entrepreneurs to help them drive lasting, transformational impact. Join Solve on this journey at solve.mit.edu.
Berinyuy Cajetan is the founder and publisher of Human Rights and Legal Research Centre (HRLRC) since 2017. He has intensive experience in strategic communications for Civil Society Organizations, campaign and advocacy, and social issues. He has an intensive experiencing in human rights monitoring, documentation and reporting.
