Contest Offers Cash Prizes To Young Teams With Best App Concepts

Contest Offers Cash Prizes To Young Teams With Best App Concepts

(NAPSI)—A national competition now in its fourth year is challenging teams of middle school- and high school-aged kids to develop concepts for mobile apps that can solve a school or community problem.

To enter the challenge, young people working in teams with a faculty adviser or group official identify a problem and propose a mobile app concept to address it. No coding experience or mobile devices are needed. A panel of STEM educators and corporate innovators will judge the app concepts. Prior winning apps enable the vision-impaired to navigate inside buildings independently, simulate chemistry experiments for classrooms that can't afford supplies, help reduce CO2 emissions through conservation education and more. Contest rules, registration and additional information are available at verizon.com/AppChallenge.

The Verizon Innovative App Challenge will award eight Best in Nation teams cash grants of $20,000 to support STEM pro- grams at their schools, and tablets for each team member. Winners will also learn how to turn their concepts into working mobile apps. The deadline for submission is Nov. 24, 2015; winners will be named in January 2016.

Best in State winners get tablets and $5,000 for their school or group plus they advance to compete at the region level. The 24 Best in Region winners will vie for the Best in Nation awards.

The App Challenge was launched in 2012 by the Verizon Foundation in partnership with the Technology Student Association, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Center for Mobile Learning @ The Media Lab and Samsung Telecommunications America. It's open to teams from all public, private and parochial middle and high schools and to teams representing nonprofit groups or clubs such as the Scouts, 4-H, Boys & Girls Clubs and many more. Kids can enter on behalf of their club or school.