The sciences are an important part of our civilization, and not enough people are interested in pursuing them. That problem led to the creation of the Junior Breakthrough Challenge, a competition established by the Breakthrough Prize Foundation. This philanthropic organization was founded by Julia and Yuri Milner. They created the challenge to fulfill their Giving Pledge and their intention to lend support to the sciences while communicating a broad range of scientific ideas. Fellow students are often the best at explaining scientific concepts and processes to students. This has made them the ideal people to communicate these ideas and boost the profiles of the sciences.
The Breakthrough Junior Challenge exists to communicate science-based ideas to young people and inspire them to pursue scientific careers. Each year, this global competition is open to students aged 13 to 18. The challenge asks participants to make science videos and enter them into a contest to win large college scholarships. Each video has to be no more than one minute and 30 seconds long, and it must breathe life into a scientific concept. The subject should be a concept or theory that is established in the life sciences, physics, or mathematics.
The Breakthrough Junior Challenge was created with the wish of Julia and Yuri Milner to inspire students and lend help to winning students as well as their teachers and schools. The contest works to give students inspiration that encourages them to go into science careers. It also seeks to increase awareness of scientific ideas. The videos created for the challenge help communicate complicated ideas and explain them to students in creative, engaging ways.
Prizes from the Breakthrough Junior Challenge
Several foundations sponsor the prizes that are awarded to contest winners. These foundations have illustrious founders such as Julia and Yuri Milner, Sergey Brin, Priscilla Chan, and Mark Zuckerberg. There is one winning science video each year, and the student who creates it wins a $250,000 college scholarship. There is also a prize of $50,000 for a teacher who gave inspiration to the student. The winner’s school receives a $100,000 science lab that will keep inspiring students to look into the sciences. The competition’s deadline is June 25th, 2022. The submitted videos are judged based on the difficulty of execution, the creativity, how much they educate people about the topic, and how well they engage the audience. Each video must be creative and highly original.
The Breakthrough Junior Challenge Previous Winners
Students from around the globe can enter this challenge, and its previous winners have made amazing, illuminating videos that helped spread the word about scientific concepts. In 2021, Amber Kwok of Mauritius was the winner. A year earlier, Maryam Tsegaye of Canada won the contest. In 2019, Jeffrey Chen of the U.S. became the winner. Samay Godika of India won the competition in 2018.
Science and the Giving Pledge
The Giving Pledge inspired Julia and Yuri Milner to create the Breakthrough Junior Challenge to inspire others as well as to teach them about science. The challenge focuses on science’s larger questions as well as the process of informing the public about them. It also seeks to boost the profile and prestige of scientists, a group of people who are too often overlooked by the public. The scientific focus of the challenge works to interest more students in the bigger questions of science as well as to inspire them to seek out the sciences. This fulfillment Julia and Yuri Milner’s Giving Pledge inspires students around the world.
