Are you ready to Power Up?
Since 2018 the Caribbean Industrial Research Institute (CARIRI) has successfully executed ICT educational programmes reaching well over 11,000 students with great success.
CARIRI and Republic Bank Limited (RBL) under the Power to Make a Difference Programme (PMAD) have partnered with each other once again to continue the development of the current generation with the next wave of technological advances.
The 2025 Innovation Nation Programme will once again maintain last year’s intake with up to 3500 participants in this cycle. To keep things interesting for this cohort of participants, we are once again launching the 2025 PowerUp Competition. The aim of this competition is to ensure that students complete the programme, keep them engaged to the end and ensure they come away with a good understanding of the concepts that will be taught
Target Audience
10 – 18 years
Power Up! will be open to all the students who actively participated in the Programme completed their course and earned their certificate.
We intend to encourage as many students as possible to participate and this would be regardless of which tracks of training that they choose
This year’s competition will challenge school teams to identify a problem that currently exists and figure out a way to solve it using technology. The problem can exist in the environment (water, land , energy, etc.) the economy , the community or can also address a better way for people to communication and socialize with each other.
A special live class to learn about pretotyping will be held on August 2025. You will receive a link to participate closer to the date. Pretotyping is a way to test a product idea quickly and inexpensively by creating an extremely simple version of the solution. The purpose and intent of creating a pretotype is to validate the idea before putting in time and money building an actual “prototype”.
Description
Can you identify a problem that currently exists and figure out a way to solve it using technology?
Can you solve a problem in the environment (water, land, energy, etc), the economy, the community you live in or can you come up with a better way for people to communicate and socialize with each other?
Each school can have no more than two (2) teams per school with a maximum of two (2) persons per team.
Each team will have to:
- Research the problem and describe how it affects the 3 P’s Planet, People and Profit.
- Design a solution to solve the problem that incorporates technology clearly demonstrating how the solution is designed, how it works and how it can be sustained via a financial model.
Create a digital video presentation of 5 minutes to submit for the chance to win.
Round 1:
- Research the problem and describe how it affects the 3 P’s Planet, People and Profit.
- Design a solution to solve the problem that incorporates technology clearly demonstrating how the solution is designed, how it works and how it can be sustained via a financial model.
- Create a digital video presentation of 5 minutes to submit for the chance to win.
- A preliminary judging panel who will go through all the applications and determine via a judging rubric, the ones that should move forward. At this point, ten (10) finalists will be selected. This will conclude round 1
Round 2:
- A panel of judges will be determining the winners from the top 10 student school team entries at a live event (5 entries in the primary school group and 5 entries in the secondary school group)
- Prior to the live event, the top 10 participant student school team members will attend a pitch session to learn what it takes to deliver a competitive pitch for their solution.
- These 10 student school teams will then be given extra time to refine the pretotype of their solution and their pitch.
- In October 2025, these 10 student school teams will have the opportunity to pitch their solution to our judges for the chance to win our grand prize.
Round 2 will then commence at a live event in October 2025 at a date to be announced. At this event, the 10 finalists will be given the opportunity to pitch their solution to another panel of judges where final winners will be determined.
How to Apply
To apply for the competition. Click the link below and fill out our competition registration form
Important Information
Live Pretotyping class
August 8th, 2025
Submission Opens
September 1st, 2025
Registration Closes
September 12th, 2025 @11:59pm
Registration Closes
October 14th, 2025
Next Steps
Why should you apply?
Apart from the chance to win cash prizes, you have the opportunity to put all of the concepts that you learned into practice and create something that can possibly create change. You can be the change-maker who developed the next app, game, gadget, social media platform, security device, etc.
You will have the opportunity to see your idea come to life; gain some media exposure to kick start your career while making valuable, beneficial connections. But most importantly, this is your chance to see your idea change the world!
Eligibility
- Submission must be your own original concept or design.
- This is an individual competition. No groups allowed. Only one prize will be awarded to the prize winner.
- Multiple submissions per individual will be accepted however only one entry will qualify to move forward.
- Copying an existing solution will not be accepted. This will result in immediate termination from the Competition.
- The proposed solution must not have been commercialized previously (it should not already be in the public domain).
- Students whose immediate family members are employees of CARIRI or Republic Bank Limited are not eligible to participate.
- The solution will remain the property of the participant.
- CARIRI reserves the right to accept or reject applications.
Competition Rules
To read more about the competition rules please see the link below:
Prizes
| Category | Placement | Prize |
|---|---|---|
| Primary Schools | 1st Place | School Trophy and $2000 RBL starter account per team member |
| 2nd Place | School Trophy and $1500 RBL starter account per team member | |
| 3rd Place | School Trophy and $1000 RBL starter account per team member | |
| 4th Place | School Trophy and $800 RBL starter account per team member | |
| 5th Place | School Trophy and $500 RBL starter account per team member | |
| Secondary Schools | 1st Place | School Trophy and $2000 RBL starter account per team member |
| 2nd Place | School Trophy and $1500 RBL starter account per team member | |
| 3rd Place | School Trophy and $1000 RBL starter account per team member | |
| 4th Place | School Trophy and $800 RBL starter account per team member | |
| 5th Place | School Trophy and $500 RBL starter account per team member |
Prizes
Category 1 (10-12 years old) | Category 2 (13 and over) | ||
|---|---|---|---|
First Place | $5,000.00 | $5000.00 | |
Second Place | $3000.00 | $3000.00 | |
Third Place | $2000.00 | $2000.00 | |
Fourth Place | $1,000.00 | $1,000.00 | |
Fifth Place | $1,000.00 | $1,000.00 |
Judging Criteria
- Identification of problem (20%)
- How clear is the problem
- Did the student back it up with research
- Innovation of solution (30%)
- How creative/innovative is the solution?
- Can it be translated into a real life solution?
- Use of concepts taught in programme (10%)
- Did the student use the concepts taught?
- Incorporation of technology and business (10%)
- Was the student able to create a linkage between the business and the technology aspect?
- Presentation (30%)
- Was the presentation clear?
Did they stick to time? - Was there passion in their presentation
- Was the presentation clear?
This competition has been approved by the NLCB
