Are you a current earth science student looking for career development, international recognition and a chance to win cash prizes? Then this is the challenge for you!
The NGEA™ is an international mining competition that offers students hands-on experience working with modern geoscience datasets encountered in the field, opportunities to improve their leadership and team-based skills, and the ability to expand their industry networks and increase potential employment opportunities.
The challenge is open to students who are either currently enrolled in an undergraduate earth science degree or post-graduate research (masters or PhD) at the time of registering. Teams are encouraged to be multi-disciplinary and include members from other fields of study (i.e., engineers, data scientists, economists, social scientists, etc.).
This year’s challenge features a grand prize of CAN$5000 for the team with the highest judges’ score. Three new prize categories of CAN$3000 each have also been created: 1) Innovation, 2) Data integration and 3) Impact & Exploration Significance.
The judges will award these prizes based on participants’ scores for each category. Teams are eligible to win both the grand prize and a category prize, however, they are not eligible to win more than one category prize.
With the final contestants presenting at the PDAC 2022 convention, the NGEA™ will contribute funds for the flight and accommodation costs to Toronto for two to four members of the finalist teams (dependent on the convention being held in-person).
It’s important to note that each team must meet a minimum of two aspects of “Team Diversity” for entry into the NGEA™. Diversity may be in the form of discipline/specialisation, gender, nationality, culture, etc. Teams that do not meet these criteria will not be eligible for the award.
Please visit www.frankarnottaward.com to enter your team!
Students now have the ability to select from eight different datasets, including two new ones from Australia and Ireland/Northern Ireland.
While additional datasets may be added, we would like to thank our current dataset providers:
Geoscience BC, Geological Survey of Ireland, Geological Survey of Northern Ireland, Geological Survey of Queensland, Geological Survey of South Australia, New South Wales Geological Survey, NRCan-Geological Survey of Canada, Saskatchewan Geological Survey, Uganda Directorate of Geological Survey and Mines (UDGSM) and the Yukon Geological Survey.
Last year’s NGEA™ was a great success with the Inca Team winning the first place prize of CAN $5000! Inca worked on the Yukon Plateau dataset and featured students from the Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marco in Peru, the University of Tasmania in Australia and Brigham Young University in the USA.
Team UWA from the University of Western Australia placed second and the CSM Exploration Initiative from the Camborne School of Mines, University of Exeter placed third.
To view all the finalists and contending teams, please visit our website.
Thank you to our sponsors for their continued support of the award! To learn more about sponsoring the award or to view the full list of sponsors, please visit our website.
Have a question for us? Check out the FAQ section on the website!
If you have any questions about the challenge, please contact us at NextGenerationExplorersAward@gmail.com.
