Rain It In Fall 2022 Student Competition

Rain It In is a competition that challenges post-secondary students to create climate resilient solutions that have a specific focus on intense rainfall and flooding. The competition provides a unique experiential learning opportunity for students to apply their knowledge and skills to a real-world problem affecting our communities. After the competition, Rain It In connects interested students with resources, mentors and programs to help with the transition from an idea to entrepreneurship and product commercialization.

For each competition, Rain It In partners with a municipality who provides a specific challenge for the students to solve. Rain It In’s Fall 2022 challenge has been generously provided by The City of London.

The first-place award is a seed grant worth $5,000 and a $500 cash prize. The second-place award is a $300 cash prize and the third-place award is a $200 cash prize.

The competition will be facilitated virtually from October 1st – November 30th, 2022 the time commitment for this project is approximately 10-15 hours. Registration is open to registered full-time or part-time students at a college or university (undergraduate or graduate) in Canada. Registration closes October 1, 2022 and project deliverables are due November 6, 2022. The top five teams will be invited to present live on November 30^th, 2022.

The Problem:

Stormwater, its impacts, mechanisms and mitigation strategies can be complex and difficult for the public to understand. However, recent trials with elementary school students revealed that hands-on experiences were much more effective at helping students understand stormwater than traditional outreach such as public information sessions, pamphlets, online information and newsletters.

The Challenge:

From recent trials with elementary school students, hands on experiences were found to be more effective at engaging and instilling understanding than traditional outreach methodologies. Therefore, students are challenged to design and create experiential kits (similarly to those offered by KiwiCo) that can be manufactured by the City to help educate the public on various stormwater topics. The kits should be professional, safe, cost-effective, and easily deployable.

Rain It In will reimburse up to $100.00 per eligible team for costs associated with the creation of a prototype.