The theme for the 2024 MESA USA National Engineering Design Competition (NEDC) is Designing for Equity Locally to Affect Sustainability Globally.

According to the World Health Organization, equity is the absence of avoidable or remedial differences. Those differences can be defined socially, physically, physiologically, geographically, economically, or demographically. Given the current state, Designing for Equity has never been more important.​

For this project, student teams will identify an individual or group who experiences some type of inequity (i.e., a user). Teams will employ human-centered design practices to engineer a solution. Teams must use a coding component as the main component of their design. Teams must use the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN-SDGs) in a community-centered capacity for their project. UN-SDG provides a broad view of global efforts to promote equity. Aligning to a goal will guide students in narrowing their focus to help their community.

Each competing team must consist of 2-4 students who are active members of a MESA program affiliated with the MESA USA national organization. Solutions and recommendation(s) for next steps will be presented at the MESA USA National Engineering Design Competition. The first place middle and high school teams from State events will participate in the national competition. This National Competition event will occur in June 2024 in California.

Competition Components

The components listed below will be used to assess the effective implementation of a human-centered design approach in the context of designing for equity, effective implementation of the engineering design process, and the functionality of the prototype.

High school and middle school teams selected to participate in the National Competition will compete in the four components below:

1. Design Proposal – The objective of the Design Proposal is to provide a brief, non-technical overview of the inspiration for the proposed solution. Students must use the provided Design Proposal Template (see Appendix).
2. Academic Poster – The objective of the Poster is to provide an overview of the project, highlight key points of the design process, discuss relevant testing and data collection, present the resulting prototype, and share recommendations for further development. Students will prepare a printed academic poster, which will be used during a public poster symposium to provide an overview of the project and the prototype.
3. Technical Pitch– The objective of the Technical Pitch is to allow students to establish their technical knowledge while they provide an overview of their design process and demonstrate their prototype functionality.
4. Symposium – The objective of the symposium is to engage an audience in a conversation about the team’s design process. Students will share a verbal abstract of their project and be available to answer judges’ questions and discuss their project with them using supporting material to emphasize their points in a conference-like setting.