The Paradigm Challenge - $100,000 Student Contest

WHAT IS THE PARADIGM CHALLENGE? 

The Paradigm Challenge is an annual competition that invites students aged 4 to 18 around the world to use kindness, creativity, and collaboration to help solve a real life problem and make a difference in the world.

SHARE YOUR ACTS OF KINDNESS BY MAY 1, 2026 AND WIN!

Inspire others with your acts of kindness. Feel free to start with random or non-random acts. Join the kindness movement and make a difference.

CREATE. Create a video, poem, story, drawing, photograph, or anything else that captures one of your acts of kindness.

SHARE. Upload your entry (or entries) to tell the world about your kindness. Then ask friends, family, and everyone else you know to vote for your entry.

WIN! The 10 entries with the most votes will win cash prizes up to $500!

THE PARADIGM CHALLENGE PROJECTS

• HOME FIRES: Fire is Everyone's Fight. Home fires occur every 90 seconds and take more lives than earthquakes, hurricanes, and tornadoes combined.
• WASTE REDUCTION: The Earth is everyone's responsibility. Everything that we need for our survival and well-being depends, either directly or indirectly, on our natural environment.
• PERSONAL HEALTH: Wellness and healing are good for everyone. Health is a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.
• FOOD SECURITY: Everyone's part of the food system. Food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical, social, and economic access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life.
• BIODIVERSITY: Biodiversity is essential to everyone. It is the variety of life on Earth, including plants, animals, micro-organisms, and the ecosystems they inhabit. Biodiversity is currently being lost at unprecedented rates due to human activities that degrade or encroach on habitats, increase pollution, and contribute to climate change.
• WHAT'S NEXT: The topic for the next Challenge Project will be announced after the current Challenge deadline. 

LETTER FROM FOUNDER & CEO JEFF RICHARDSON 

We created The Paradigm Challenge because we believe that youth have an innate ability to innovate for good. We are thrilled to share with you that students from 173 different countries stepped forward to accept the Challenge to use kindness, creativity, and collaboration to make a difference in the world. We are both humbled and excited by how quickly The Challenge has become a global youth movement. 

During our first two Challenges, students around the world generated a wide range of incredible ideas to reduce injuries and fatalities from home fires (Year 1) and help the environment through the reduction of waste (Year 2). This year, we have a new challenge for the 2.3 billion youth in the world. We invite students aged 4 to 18 to generate new ideas to improve personal health through wellness and healing. 

Wellness and healing are good for everyone. If you are between the ages of 4 and 18 (as of the May 1, 2018 entry deadline), please accept this Challenge, form a team, and submit your best ideas. Like in the past, the top 100 student entries will win cash prizes of up to $100,000! 

If you are over 18, please help us spread the word about The Paradigm Challenge to youth, parents, teachers, and others. We offer more than $50,000 in cash grants to teachers and others who inspire students to participate in The Paradigm Challenge. 

Finally, we hope you will take a moment to review our site to learn more about our projects. We welcome all questions, comments, and suggestions regarding our mission in general or any of our initiatives. 

Thank you for your interest in our foundation, Project Paradigm. 

Best, 
Jeff Richardson
Founder & CEO