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UK Junior Water Prize open for entries

By Steve Castle posted 05-04-2024 10:04

  

The UK Junior Water Prize challenges young people in STEM to develop innovative yet practical solutions to our global water crisis.

The winning UK entry receives £1,000 in cash plus the opportunity to go on an all-expenses paid trip to represent the UK and their school at the Stockholm Junior Water Prize competition in Sweden, with a chance to win the cash award of US$15,000!

Minimum entry requirements

  • Aged 15-20
  • Based in the UK
  • In secondary education when research was conducted
  • Max. 2 co-applicants

Do you work with STEM students who meet the above requirements? We have an outreach hub to help you talk about UKJWP!

Important dates

  • Submissions open: February
  • Application deadline: 13 May (9am)
  • Virtual Q&A: 28 & 29 May*
  • Winner notified: 30 May
  • Winner announcement: 4-6 June, at Flood & Coast*
  • International competition: 24-29 Aug*

*You will need to be available on these dates. We will work with you as much as possible to avoid any clashes with exams.

Project stages

  1. Consult the full UKJWP entry guidelines
  2. Choose a topic to research
  3. Decide on a key hypothesis
  4. Collate background information
  5. Conduct experiments & research
  6. Analyse the results
  7. Proofread and finetune your paper

Next steps

  • If your application is shortlisted, you will be asked to present your project to the jury in a virtual meeting.
  • If the jury names you the winner, you will have to create an academic poster and 2-minute video pitch for the international round.

The UK Junior Water Prize competition is organised by CIWEM, in partnership with Jacobs and Arup. If you have any questions, you can contact us at awards@ciwem.org.

Find out more and enter

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07-04-2024 09:05

Last year, my team studied boat wakes in relation to bank erosion. We got to the final but didn't make it to the top prize. Hopefully this short clip will make you laugh!

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06-04-2024 11:09

I entered teams into this amazing competition in 2022 and 2023 (working with two different schools.) I also visited the Water Week Conference while on holiday in Stockholm last summer to check out the global entries. I don't have an entry this year but have got two high-ability14-y-o students who have started a pollution project that we'll probably enter in 2025. 

My feedback - this is a great competition, but the time commitment means that it's best suited (IMHO) to the non-examination years - Y10 and Y12. The standard is high and it's focused on individuals or pairs only. Our other STEM competition work this year involves much larger numbers of students with a broader range of abilities.

Having said that, the top prize is amazing! There's nothing else like it.