We are excited to kick off the 3rd year of our Boston University Questrom School of Business $50K Sustainability Case Competition!
Scroll down to understand the process and how to apply.
- After classes start in September, we will hold a live information session on September 12th at 5 pm (EST) so that different schools across the country can ask any questions.
- Applications will close on September 13th at 5 pm (EST).
- The beauty of this case competition is that students in any degree-seeking program are welcome to collaborate on teams.
Team Composition
- Graduate students working with undergraduates (or as an undergraduate only or graduate only team).
- PhD students and graduate students can collaborate.
- It’s even possible for PhD students to work with sophomores.
- You do not have to be a business major or minor to participate!
Current Students Only
- Everyone on the team must be a current, degree-seeking student
- Alumni should not be on a team working with current students
- All team members must be enrolled at the same school
- To be on a team, you can’t have graduated before the end of December 2024
Process Overview
- After the registration portal opens, we will give each school up to 30 submissions.
- This means that if we receive more than 30 applications, we will use a random number generator to select each of the 30 teams blindly.
- Rest assured, this process is designed to ensure full fairness, maintaining the integrity of the event.
Countdown to our fall competition
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Phase 1
- In Phase One, we will send the case study to the first set of teams at each school and ask you to read it over a few days and offer recommendations—again, following complete anonymity.
What does this mean?
- Please do not identify your school at all in the write-up and only use your first name and last initial.
- There will be hired reviewers with no academic affiliation who need to know which school submissions they are reviewing.
- From the 30 selections per school, they will select one of them.
Phase 2
- All selected teams will visit Boston University Questrom School of Business on November 16th for Phase Two.
- You will be in different classrooms.
- Each of the teams will independently present their recommendations and analysis for the second case that we will issue to you a few weeks in advance
- This time, the PowerPoint you deliver, unlike a written submission, will be reviewed by judges who will engage in live Q&A
- In each of those classrooms, the judges will select a single advancing team
- Again, we ask that you follow the rules in terms of using the slide template, a minimum number of 30 slides (including implementation and risk assessment), the content on the slide, the font sizes, and most importantly, preserving anonymity by only using your first names and last initial
- The judges will select the advancing teams, and then, we might have a little bit of a twist between each stage of the competition:
- For example, a new piece of information might be introduced
- From the Preliminary Round on the morning of the 16th, advancing teams will present successively that same day in the Quarter-Finals and Semi-Finals.
- At this point, the client for the second case study will be coming on campus.
- After revising/tweaking their presentations, each finalist will present their recommendations to the case study’s client live.
- The client will select a single winner!
- The second twist is that you can watch their judging deliberations— they will be live-streamed!
- The winner of the 2nd $50K Boston University Questrom School of Business Sustainability Case Competition will receive USD 50,000, with one requirement:
- The winning team will donate 10% of its winnings to a registered and approved 501(c)(3) nonprofit whose focus is on sustainability
- We look forward to receiving your application, and you will be selected for Phase One to compete against other schools in Phase Two.
- Best of luck to everyone!
If you have questions, please feel free to contact us:
