Design Event

Additional Guidance

It works best if judges do their own scoring; rather than conferring and trying to agree on one score for that team. The judges scores can then be averaged to determine the winners.

The judges should ultimately determine their own scores; having criteria to consider (innovation, viability, presentation skills, etc.) is useful, but ultimately have them assign each team one score (on a scale of 1-20, for example), weighting the categories however the judge sees fit.

Determine how to handle tie-breakers; For example, if two teams both scored an average of 18/20, then the team with the highest single score from a judge wins.

Decide whether teams with ideas that have been used in formal competitions like DECA are allowed to participate; Ideas that have been battle-tested tend to have an advantage over new ideas and new presenters. One option is to allow the students to still participate but they have to pick a new product/service to pitch.

When picking the venue, err on the smaller side; A packed school library or classroom looks and feels better than an empty auditorium.

Be conservative when initially advertising the awards; Early on, it's difficult to determine the prize amounts—you don’t know how much funding you’ll receive — so give people a pleasant surprise if more money gets raised than expected.

Pitch competitions are meant to be relatively rapid fire; a good rule of thumb is a five-minute presentation, followed by two minutes of questions by the judges in order to prevent presentation fatigue. Also, don’t schedule more than 10 teams; this keeps the presentation time at under an hour and a half.