Last week Thursday was the deadline to submit a video to this year’s World of 7 Billion student video contest. The contest challenged students to demonstrate a connection between world population growth with one global challenge – deforestation, water scarcity or public health – and come up with a sustainable solution all in a 60-second video.
Traditionally, the contest has been open only to high school students. But for the first time this year we opened up the contest to middle school students as well and have been overwhelmed by the positive response.
Here are some highlights from this year’s student contest:
- Over 1,800 video submissions were received
- Roughly 28% of submissions came from 6, 7, or 8 grade students
- Roughly 72% of submissions came from 9, 10, 11, or 12 grade students
- Over 20 countries participated in the contest
- Over 40 U.S. states participated in the contest
- The most popular topic for middle school students was Water Scarcity
- The most popular topic for high school students was Deforestation
Our PopEd team and panel of expert judges is excited to start vetting this year’s video submissions. Stay tuned for finalist announcements by April 4th and winners announced by May 10!