The Schmidt-MacArthur Fellowship Launches Global Wild Card Competition for 2014

LONDON, December 17, 2013 /PRNewswire/ --

The Schmidt-MacArthur Wild Card Competition is open to post-graduate students and their faculty mentors from any university in the world to innovate for a circular economy. The winner will join 14 other students from leading universities including MIT, Yale University, Stanford University, Tongji University, National Institute of Design, India and London Business School, on the Schmidt-MacArthur Fellowship programme in 2014.

The Schmidt-MacArthur Fellowship, a joint initiative between the Ellen MacArthur Foundation in the UK and the Schmidt Family Foundation in the United States, offers an innovation platform for postgraduate students and academics from top international design, engineering and business schools to rethink the economy.

Dame Ellen MacArthur, Founder of the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, said: "The Schmidt-MacArthur Fellowship launched in 2013 with a group of globally-recognised Partner Universities who see the circular economy as a credible and exciting perspective for positive change. After the success of the first year, and as part of our commitment to build a truly international network of future circular economy leaders, we wanted to extend that opportunity to a student and mentor outside of our current Fellowship group."

'The Schmidt-MacArthur fellows, embedded with their mentors in our Partner Universities in the UK, Europe, the US, India and China, represent the first wave of what we expect will be a systematic movement of young people, thinkers, inventors, entrepreneurs, and future business leaders. They will take what they've learned and apply their innovative thinking to doing things differently within the industries and institutions that shape our world,' said Wendy Schmidt, President of the Schmidt Family Foundation.

To take part in the competition, entrants must be registered on a post-graduate course in design, engineering or business at an accredited educational institution in 2014. Both the student and academic must be committed to taking part in the full one-year fellowship and be available to attend the summer school in the UK during 23-27 June 2014. The challenge for entrants is to create a 1 minute 40 second film in response to a challenge statement about the circular economy that can be shared publicly. The shortlisted entries will go through to an online interview phase with a selection team from the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, UK.

Applicants must first register their interest at http://www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/wildcard in order to download the competition brief on 13 January 2014.