This is a sponsored post
When our kids were preschoolers, their curiosity was apparent in endless questions about the world and how it works. Sometimes we knew the answers and other times we didn’t, but it didn’t stop them from asking.
The curiosity that our kids had when they were little is just as important as they get older. Identifying problems, coming up with solutions, and a passion for solving problems are characteristics of scientists and exactly what the 3M Young Scientist Challenge is trying to cultivate in the next generation of kids.
About the 3M Young Scientist Challenge
Many of the greatest innovations of our time were first designed to solve simple problems for which we didn’t even know we needed solutions. The 3M Young Scientist Challenge is the nation’s premier science competition for grades 5-8 and encourages young people to solve everyday problems using science and innovation.
This one-of-a-kind video competition has sparked a sense of wonder and discovery in hundreds of thousands of students. It encourages fostering curiosity and passion to find new solutions to existing problems and has enhanced science, innovation and communication across the United States.
Since launched by Discovery Communications in 1999, the Young Scientist Challenge had the same mission it does today: to foster a new generation of American scientists at an age when interest in science generally declines. In 2008, Discovery Education joined forces with 3M – one of the world’s most notable innovators – to cultivate the next generation of problem-solvers and give students the unique opportunity to work directly with 3M scientists.
How to Enter the 3M Young Scientist Challenge
Where do new solutions to existing problems come from? The Young Scientist Challenge believes that tweens’ family, classmates, hobbies, or even something they see on TV, YouTube or social media could inspire them to come up with the greatest innovation of your generation.
Since inspiration can come from the most unexpected places, the first step to entering the 3M Young Scientist Challenge is having your tween identify how they could improve lives for the future in health, safety, mobility, the environment, energy consumption, or the community.
Here are some examples of the types of innovations your tween might already be thinking about that could make a great submission.
Improving Health
Not only does science solve the biggest problems inside the human body, but it also helps us create the tools that doctors, nurses and other healthcare professionals need to improve – and save – lives.
What kind of innovation would:
- Prevent the spread of germs or illness when you’re sick?
- Develop a new material to heal scars or injuries?
- Detect and alert people of chronic diseases before they show symptoms?
- Make healthcare products available to underdeveloped communities?
- Improve the way medications are administered?
- Make physical or mental healthcare more accessible?
- Organize healthcare information in a way that any of your doctors can access it?
- Detect or prevent food poisoning?
Improving Safety
Whether you’re on the sports field or crossing the street, safety should always come first. Not only can we use science to protect our bodies, but we can also help improve quality of life by making the things we consume safer and cleaner.
What kind of innovation would:
- Improve the quality of food?
- Prevent young children from accidental injuries?
- Reduce the risk of injury on construction sites?
- Advance the tools used to heal from a sports injury?
- Prevent identity theft?
- Improve filtration systems for air, water and other natural resources?
- Make buildings or transportation methods more durable or reliable?
Improving Mobility
As populations continue to move toward urban areas, science and innovation can help make these cities “smarter”. Smart vehicles, road safety and public transit are a few of the transportation mechanisms that will become increasingly important as we figure out how to improve movement within and between the planet’s most populated locations.
What kind of innovation would:
- Make airplanes, cars and trains run more efficiently?
- Make city infrastructure compatible with the technology we all have at our fingertips?
- Improve mobility with devices or products in a unique way?
- Connect the traffic and safety functions of a city with vehicles on the roads and rails?
- Eliminate the need for a diesel engine or electric motor in trains
Improving the Environment
Our planet holds precious resources, and it is our responsibility to properly manage them so future generations can enjoy the same quality of life that we do. Through science, we can reduce our environmental footprint and enhance how we use natural resources in the most efficient ways.
What kind of innovation would:
- Make drinking water cleaner for people across the world?
- Reduce your carbon footprint?
- Ensure clean breathing air for people in all communities?
- Create new ways to use recycled materials?
- Clean up our oceans and forests for their animal inhabitants?
- Build more products with less material?
- Make it easier for people to recycle?
Improving Energy Consumption
Energy is the key to keeping the world working, but it’s a natural resource that is frequently used and abused. With the help of science, we can create and conserve energy in new and innovative ways that really keep the lights on.
What kind of innovation would:
- Provide electricity to underdeveloped countries?
- Create transportation that is less harmful to the environment?
- Reduce energy used in homes and office buildings?
- Produce energy in ways that is least harmful to the environment?
- Reuse energy in creative ways?
Improving the Community
Science touches every part of our lives, even if it is not obvious at first. Think about the major challenges in your life or the lives of those important to you, and how you could solve them through scientific thinking.
What kind of innovation would:
- Help to reduce traffic accidents, jams or other transportation hazards?
- Improve airline screening and/or security tools to make air transportation safer and/or more efficient?
- Make public transportation more accessible to people with disabilities, limitations or challenges?
- Create a better system for finding a missing pet?
- Protect people during a natural disaster or emergency?
- Create affordable housing for city dwellers that is also safe and easily accessible?
After thinking about the above six entry topics on the Young Scientist Challenge website, have your tweens create a 1-2 minute video demonstrating why they were inspired to solve their chosen problem. The 3M “Scientists as Storytellers” e-tool-kit might provide some inspiration while the Challenge Video Tips webpage and YouTube video contain advice from past Top Young Scientists.
Participating in the Young Scientist Challenge offers academic, personal and social benefits that extend well beyond the contest framework. Finalists become a part of the scientific community and get great experience that can also be shared on college résumés and through essays.
This post is sponsored by Discovery Education but all opinions are my own.
