How To Submit A Design for 2021 Stanford Center on Longevity Design Challenge

The Stanford Center on Longevity Design Challenge is a global competition that encourages students to design products and services to improve well-being across the lifespan. In its eighth year, the Challenge is focused on ideas inspired by the cultural shift that has occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic that supports long, healthy, and happy lives for everyone.

This year’s contest challenges teams to create solutions for “After the Pandemic: Designing the Next Version of our World.”

The COVID-19 pandemic is bringing into sharper focus the cultural norms that guide us through life and is providing insights about what a new future might look like. The suddenness of this transformation is allowing us to examine daily practices, social norms, and institutions from perspectives that are rarely possible. For a short window of time, before new routines and practices replace familiar old ones, we will see with greater clarity how our lives might be improved, how current shifts could become enduring changes, what new norms might emerge, and how a new future might look. 

This year, they are challenging students to design solutions for this new post-pandemic future, keeping in mind both how these solutions affect people throughout the life span, and how they can be designed in ways that are accessible to all. They should take into account what we are learning during the pandemic and how it is changing our lives. 

What Kinds Of Designs Are Included?

Solutions for remote or virtual access will be included in the scope of the challenge, but they encourage participants to think more broadly. These products, programs, or services can be for work, school, healthcare, fitness, personal relationships, or any other aspect of life. Here are a few examples of questions raised by the pandemic that could be addressed: 

• If remote work is to become more common, are there ways in which we can re-invigorate local community connections as people spend more time at home?
• How can more people of any age access quality education from anywhere?
• How can healthcare be administered equitably with limited resources?
• What are the best ways for different generations to connect when they live apart?
• How can we maintain our health and fitness without going to the gym?
• What have we learned from our change in activity about how we can reduce our impact on the environment, and how can we apply those lessons going forward?

Awards

• Cash prizes:
  • 1st place: $10,000
  • 2nd place: $5,000
  • 3rd place: $2,000
• Finalists receive mentorship and personalized coaching from industry experts and researchers.
• Finalists receive airfare and hotel reimbursement (limited max value) for a student to attend the Finals at Stanford University to present their idea to investors and potential customers.
• Finalists attend an entrepreneurial workshop at Stanford and learn how to create a business plan to take their concept into execution.

Eligibility

• Open to teams of 2-5 students enrolled during the 2020-2021 academic year, attending any accredited university or college globally. 
• Each team must have at least one full-time student and if the team is selected as a Finalist, only students may present.

Judging Criteria

The Challenge will be judged by experts in design and technology including carefully selected academics with expertise on the topic; executives from technology and consumer goods firms; venture capitalists; and senior representatives from related mission-driven organizations.

The judging criteria below will be used by the judges:

• 40% Impact – will the design improve long life outcomes?
• 30% Originality – has this idea been seen before? Is there something similar to it on the market?
• 20% Feasibility – will the design work? Can it be produced at scale?
• 10% Affordability – teams must identify their target population for the design. Would the cost of the design at scale make it a viable product for that population?

A separate score reflecting alignment of the design to the topic will be added as a weight to the overall score. For example, if a design were to score 90% on the judging criteria above but only 50% on alignment, the overall score would be 45% (.90 X .50).

How To Apply

The challenge runs concurrent with the 2020-2021 academic year, with initial submissions due by December 10, 2020 and finalists presenting at Stanford University in April, 2021.

Click To Submit A Design

For more information, visit Stanford Center on Longevity

Application Deadline: December 10, 2020