Status Report

Conrad Foundation Spirit of Innovation People’s Choice Awards – Everyone Has a Chance to Vote

By SpaceRef Editor
April 15, 2011
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We need your vote! The annual Spirit of Innovation Awards is kicking off a two-week People’s Choice competition (http://www.conradawards.org/competition) that challenges high school students to solve real-world problems by creating commercially viable science and technology based products. 27 teams of high school students have created unique inventions in the categories of aerospace exploration, clean energy, and cyber security. From Space Sleeping Pods to Solar Wind Power Generators to Parabolic Stoves and mobile apps that signal for help during times of duress, the 2011 Spirit of Innovation Awards high school student competitors have risen to the challenge and need your vote.

Join us in supporting these student innovators!

From April 13th to April 27th, you can cast your vote for your favorite teams in each category by going to http://conradawards.org/teams/finalist_teams. This year’s People’s Choice champion will be announced Sunday, May 1 during the closing ceremonies of the 2011 Innovation Summit at NASA’s Ames Research Center. The Summit, April 28 – May 1st, is the culmination of the Spirit of Innovation Awards as the student teams present their products to entrepreneurs, scientists, and industry professionals, and compete for $5,000 Next Step Grants. The People’s Choice votes will be incorporated as 10 percent of the final judging score for these scholarships. The team with the most People’s Choice votes will win $250, and the team with the most Facebook “likes” will go on a personal tour of the Facebook Headquarters in Palo Alto, CA.

Voting ends on April 27, 2011.

This is an incredible chance to support innovation in education and we would like you to extend this exciting opportunity to your readers before it’s too late. If you would like to feature this opportunity on your blog or if you need more information regarding the Conrad Foundation or the Spirit of Innovation Awards, please let me know. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Thanks and best,

Christin Dorsey
Account Coordinator, Social Radius
1237A Third Street Promenade
Santa Monica, CA 90401
christin@socialradius.com

About The Conrad Foundation

The Conrad Foundation Spirit of Innovation Awards (SoIA) is an international, multi-disciplinary program that combines the Foundation’s commitment to five core principles: innovation, education, entrepreneurship, project-based learning, and community engagement to advance achievement in science, technology, education and math in U.S. schools.

SoIA presents student participants with a very broad challenge: create an innovative product that can be used to address a real-world problem with a real-world solution that can ultimately be viable in the commercial marketplace. Students are given a blank slate within several major categories, including clean energy, aerospace exploration, clean water, agro science, and cyber security. They’re also required to conduct research to determine their creation’s potential market impact, and develop a full business plan while working with mentors including world-class scientists, engineers, academics, and business leaders.

SpaceRef staff editor.