Students one step closer to $1 million prize

A team of Grand Valley graduate students and alumni will compete for a chance to win $1 million during the 7th annual Hult Prize Challenge regional competition.

The Hult Prize Challenge is the largest international social innovation competition 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.”

During a quarterfinals competition December 10 at Grand Valley, 10 teams comprised of undergraduate and graduate students, as well as alumni, competed for a chance to advance to one of the Hult Prize regional finals taking place in 2016.

The winning Grand Valley team consisted of Kathryn Christopher, product design and manufacturing engineering graduate student, Joseph Kissling, mechanical engineering graduate student, Briauna Taylor, nursing practice doctoral candidate, and Brittany Taylor, '14, finance and management major.

The team pitched "Platform for Progress," a platform that would help provide mass communication and resource sharing, as well as education and training, to residents of overpopulated and underserved communities. Christopher explained that the platform would utilize text messaging as a way for these particular populations to receive information about entrepreneurial workshops and training sessions. These sessions would focus on teaching people how to provide basic necessities, such as water, shelter and food, to help their communities while also creating income.

"If Platform for Progress can provide training and education on how to construct a sand filter and sell the clean water from it, for example, we can then provide the individuals a microloan for the materials they will need to construct the sand filter," Christopher said. "That person can then sell the clean water, generating income for themselves, as well as sell water to their neighbors at a price lower than what they would normally pay."

Christopher and her team will travel to Boston, Massachusetts March 11-12 to compete in the Hult Prize regional competition.

"This competition has shown us how we can use our knowledge and skill sets to make a huge impact on the world," Christopher said. "I personally have been able to practice my skills in design thinking, as well as utilize my knowledge in engineering to work collaboratively as a team to develop a solution."

Should the Grand Valley team win the regional competition, the group will present their final pitch at the Clinton Global Initiative annual meeting and Hult Prize Global Finals and Awards Ceremony in New York City in September.

For more information, visit the Richard M. and Helen DeVos Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation website or contact Michael Kurley at [email protected].