Hult Prize offers students chance at $1 million

Grand Valley students interested in competing for a chance to win $1 million during the 7th annual Hult Prize Challenge are encouraged to attend an informational session Tuesday, October 6. The meeting will take place in the Mary Idema Pew Library Multipurpose Room from 5-6 p.m.

The Hult Prize Challenge is the largest international social innovation competition in the world for young entrepreneurs. Participants form small start-up companies to compete for $1 million in funding while working to solve the planet’s toughest challenges. This year’s competition theme is “crowded urban spaces.”

“This opportunity for Grand Valley students to participate in an international design-thinking based competition is too good to pass up, especially for a chance at $1 million and the opportunity to potentially make an impact on a global scale,” said John Berry, Design Thinking Initiative director. “I’m hoping that many students from all of Grand Valley’s internal colleges will consider creating teams and showcasing the interdisciplinary problem-solving talent this university has to offer.”

Students, both undergraduate and graduate, as well as alumni, interested in participating will be asked to form teams of three-to-five people.

The Hult Prize competition at Grand Valley will be held December 10 from 5-9 p.m. in the Kirkhof Center, room 2215/16. The winner of the Grand Valley contest will receive an automatic entry into one of the five regional competitions. The regional finals, which will take place during individual competitions around the world in Boston, San Francisco, London, Dubai and Shanghai, will be held March 11-12.

In 2014, more than 20,000 university students worldwide participated in the annual competition, which aimed to solve issues revolving around early childhood development and education.

For more information, visit gvsu.edu/cei or contact Michael Kurley at [email protected].