Deadline: December 31, 2016 and February 28, 2017
The World Bank and the Wharton School invite students and young professionals from around the world to develop innovative ideas for financing and implementing the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. Ideas for Action, now hosting its third global competition, aims to provide young leaders with a unique opportunity to help shape the global development agenda. Students and young professionals from around the world are invited participate.
Past winning proposals include a peer-to-peer hyper local approach to last-mile delivery in Nigeria, a mobile platform that allows users to inform themselves and alert others of traffic and security problems in real time, and a novel micro-insurance product for remittance payments in India.
Winners of the competition will present their ideas during the IMF & World Bank Annual Meetings, receive support from a dedicated startup accelerator at the Wharton School, and benefit from unique networking opportunities with other young leaders as well as some of the most senior decision-makers in international development, academia, and the private sector.
Benefits
Winners of the competition will
- Present their ideas at the IMF & World Bank Annual Meetings,
- Receive support from a dedicated startup accelerator at the Wharton School, and
- Benefit from unique networking opportunities with experts from international development, academia, and the private sector.
Eligibility
- Teams must consist of two to six members and may be formed across different schools, institutions, companies, countries, nationalities etc.
- Students and young professionals between the ages 18 and 35 from around the world are invited participate. Youths between the ages of 14 to18 may participate in the high school initiative, Ideas for Action 14-18.
- Teams must register at www.ideas4action.org prior to submitting their proposal. Once registered, teams will receive additional materials to help them prepare their proposals.
- Submission requirements can be found on the website.
How to Apply
- High School (14-18 Years) – Register Now
- Young Adults (18-35 Years) – Register Now
Your Proposal:
Submit an executive summary (1-2 pages). Your executive summary should include the following:
- Title and team name
- Explanation of the problem and context: Briefly describe the problem that your proposal is addressing.
- Your solution: Succinctly describe your idea (including design, target population, stakeholders, incentives, and implementation)
- Expected impact: Why is it relevant?
Proposals should be submitted directly to the I4A email account [email protected] in Microsoft Word or PDF format. Please name your file as follows: “2017_Country_TeamName”.
Timeline
Teams are encouraged to submit an executive summary of their proposal by December 31, 2016. A jury will provide feedback that will help teams develop their full proposals by February 28, 2017. Alternatively, teams can elect to skip the executive summary stage and submit only a full proposal:
- Deadline for submitting executive summaries: December 31, 2016
- Deadline for full proposal submissions: February 28, 2017
- Announcement of submissions selected for the final round: March 21, 2017
- Deadline for final submissions: April 17, 2017
For more information, visit World Bank Ideas for Action Competition.
