Industrial Design Competition

“The SourceAmerica Design Challenge is a national engineering competition in which participants create innovative workplace technologies for people with disabilities. The innovations enhance employment options and increase productivity in the work environment. There are two levels: one for high school and one for college.

Student teams collaborate with a nonprofit agency that employs people with disabilities, and/or they work directly with an individual who is experiencing difficulties in the workplace. The goal of this partnership is to invent a process, device, system or software that enhances productivity or helps an individual with disabilities overcome workplace obstacles. Inventions are evaluated based on their impact in the workplace.”

How do I get started? Visit the Source America Design Challenge website.

How do I expand this narrative arc? If you are interested in purpose build design and engineering think about leaning deeper into some of the other engineering programs engaging teens. For example:

• ry to win big at Toshiba Exploravision, where teams of students in grades K-12 submit designs for new technology that benefits society.

• Join a global collaborative learning adventure to create a vessel that creates zero emissions and zero waste with Project Z-Nev

• Build green technology at one of the intensive and highly rewarding summer programs at Cooper Union

• Design a nature-inspired solution to a climate change problem in the Biomimicry Institute’s Design Challenge

HOT TIP: This is a really cool way to combine your design and engineering skills with a public good. Accessibility is a huge issue in the workplace, and it’s incredible that a teen could have some influence over how workplaces are better designed. The potential to work with a big company like Source America is also a big status boost. So if you have the engineering skills and inclination, start putting them to some good.