Find teammates; win money; have fun

Extended video submission deadline: New deadline: December 15, 2015

Did you ever have an awesome project idea that you just couldn’t get off the ground because you didn’t have a particular skill (PCB design, Arduino programming, gear systems…)?

Did you ever have a prototype for something and just wanted to tell the world and get them to invest in you and your product?

Have you ever wanted to land your dream job and needed to present yourself and your accomplishments during an interview in a compelling way?

Communication is everything these days, and the only way to get attention and funding for your ideas is to present them in a concise, persuasive way. IEEE Region 6 is proud to sponsor a competition with up to $1500 in prize money for students who upload a compelling video pitch for their next project, company idea, or hackathon team.

Ideas: Here are some topic ideas to get you going. Also see slides from the pitching workshop held at all the Area meetings this fall as a general outline (http://ow.ly/TSh0D).

1. Pitch a project — say you want to work on a cool extracurricular project, either for a hackathon, capstone/thesis, or simply for fun. This kind of pitch is to attract your fellow IEEE Student Members as talent to help you get the project moving
2. Pitch your research — say you want to advance your undergraduate research. This kind of pitch is to persuade your faculty advisor to provide you the resources to let you go deeper in pursuit of a research question of interest to you both.
3. Pitch IEEE! — say you want to recruit new members to join your branch. Why would they join? How would they benefit? What if they don’t have any spare time?

Rules: The rules are simple: upload a 1-2 minute video of your pitch (and your teammates, if you have any) somewhere public (YouTube, Vimeo), and let the organizers know about it by emailing kate@ejenta.com. We are judging based on quality of the presentation, NOT technical quality of the recording, so don’t worry if you don’t have access to facilities. Ideally we are looking for a project you will genuinely work on during the spring semester 2016.

Eligibility: Current IEEE student members in Region 6 are eligible to win the prize money and participate in the Lightning Rounds at the Rising Stars conference Jan 2-4 in Las Vegas (students, their branches, and their sections are responsible for travel arrangements). Current IEEE Young Professional (YP) and student members worldwide are eligible to participate in the Lightning Rounds at Rising Stars (after securing their own travel arrangements) but unfortunately are not eligible for the cash prizes. Winners will be chosen by a panel of qualified engineering professionals and separate winners will be chosen by counting what are deemed to be eligible online votes by a combination of social media.

Bonus: If your project has humanitarian benefits, we will work with you to get publicity and notice through SusTech, the IEEE Sustainability Technology Conference, and GHTC, the IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference.

Timeline:

Submission deadline has been extended to December 15!. Winners of the video portion will have the opportunity to present onstage at the Rising Stars Conference, January 2-4, 2016 (register by December 4 for early bird pricing! http://sites.ieee.org/risingstars/2016-rising-stars-conference/registration/). Winners are responsible for making their own travel arrangements to Las Vegas.

During the Rising Stars conference, another workshop will be held for those who were unable to attend the first rounds during the month of October. A live session will then be held with prizes available for the best presenters from the Lightning Rounds.

PRIZES:

• $500: Judged best video. For uploading an eligible video with the best explanation/persuasion of the idea
• $250 People’s choice best video. By online voting.
• $500 Judged best live demo. For explaining their idea in the most compelling manner on stage.
• $250 People’s choice best demo chosen by audience.