Deadline Extended: January 5, 2018
Opportunity Desk (OD) is pleased to invite applications from across the world for the 2017 Opportunity Desk Impact Challenge (ODIC). The Challenge seeks to recognize and support efforts of young changemakers working to bring positive change to their communities, while projecting and highlighting the impact OpportunityDesk.org (OD) is making in the lives of people worldwide. This year’s challenge is organized in partnership with Lamville and Scholarship Academy Africa.
The competition is simple – ODIC challenges participants to answer two main questions in 60 seconds:
- What are you doing to bring positive change to your community? Tell us the problem you are solving and how it is making a difference.
- How is OD making an impact in your life?
About Opportunity Desk
OD is an online platform that bridges the opportunity gap for people across the world, by creating open access to information and educative resources. These opportunities help to facilitate young people’s efforts in exchanging ideas and preparing themselves for the future. They include: scholarships, conferences, fellowships, awards, jobs, internships, and grants targeted towards individuals and organizations worldwide.
Since inception in 2012, Opportunity Desk has reached 186,200 people from over 180 countries around the world. Our website currently attracts more than 500,000 views monthly with about 100,000 people connected and engaged with us on social media.
Prizes and Benefits
The top 12 finalists will receive e-certificates of recognition.
First Prize:
- $100 cash prize to support your work
- Website revamp or Design worth $500 by Lamville
- Exclusive media feature on OD as Young Person of the Month in 2018
- One-month Mentoring (this involves four hours of mentoring spread out during the month).
- Digital Certificate
- Free review of up to 3 applications (scholarship, fellowship or other)
- Two months scholarship consultancy with Scholarship Academy Africa.
Second Prize:
- $100 cash prize to support your work
- Website revamp or Design worth $500 by Lamville
- One-month Mentoring (this involves four hours of mentoring spread out during the month).
- Exclusive media feature on OD as Young Person of the Month in 2018
- Digital Certificate
- Free review of up to 2 applications
- Two months scholarship consultancy with Scholarship Academy Africa.
Third Prize:
- $100 cash prize to support your work
- Website revamp or Design worth $500 by Lamville
- One-month Mentoring (this involves four hours of mentoring spread out during the month).
- Exclusive media feature on OD as Young Person of the Month in 2018
- Digital Certificate
- Free review of 1 application (scholarship, fellowship or other)
- Two months scholarship consultancy with Scholarship Academy Africa.
Eligibility
- Participants between 18 and 30 years from any nationality are welcome to apply
- Participants should be active Opportunity Desk Users. To be considered an active user, you are either a fan/follower on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram; or you must be subscribed to our email newsletter.
- Participants should be actively engaged in their communities.
- Videos can be made in any language. However, non-English videos must be subtitled in English Language.
- Team members and mentors at Opportunity Desk are not eligible for this contest.
Terms and Conditions
- There is no entry fee
- Video submissions must be original, unpublished work by the contestant and cannot infringe upon any copyright laws. The contestant must be the sole author of all entries and hold full rights to them. Videos that have won awards in other competitions are not eligible to enter;
- By entering the contest, video submitters are deemed to have agreed to the use of their videos in OD promotional material;
- The organizers reserve the right to remove and disqualify submitted videos which may cause offence or may be deemed unsuitable or inappropriate for this contest;
- The contestant must have received permission from the subject(s) used in the video. Videos that violate the rights of those depicted or put people at risk will not be considered by the judges;
- Opportunity Desk can take no responsibility for entries that are incorrectly or incompletely submitted.
Judging Criteria
The jury is made up of social change leaders and impact drivers who will carefully select the top 3 ideas based on the following criteria:
- Innovation and impact of your project (50%)
- Impact of OD in your life (30%)
- Clarity of video & Statement of purpose (10%)
- Social media response (Likes/Shares/Comments) (10%)
How to Enter the Competition
- Step 1: Make a one-minute video telling us:
- a) your name and country;
- b) what you are doing to bring positive change to your community;
- c) how OD is making an impact in your life.
You don’t need a sophisticated camera to do this. You can use your smartphone in landscape mode. Just ensure we can see and hear you clearly. Be creative too.
- Step 2: Upload your video to YouTube or Vimeo or any other video-sharing platform
- Step 3: Complete the online application. You will be required to enter the link to your video.
- Step 4: Give us a shout-out to let us know you have submitted your application by tagging us on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram with @OpportunityDesk and the hashtags #ODImpactChallenge #ODIC2017. You can also ask us any question on social media using these hashtags.
Ready? Simply prepare your video, then apply: http://bit.ly/ODICapply.
For more information, visit Opportunity Desk Impact Challenge.
