Deadline:
April 30, 2025
Location(s)
Online Switzerland
Overview
Eager to stimulate reflection and innovation on development from diverse disciplinary and contextual perspectives and with the generous support of Ambassador Jenö Staehelin, the Graduate Institute has launched in 2014 the Advancing Development Goals Contest, an annual international competition for Master students.
Every year, the participants are invited provide contributions that are both theoretically grounded and offer pragmatic solutions to a specific relevant international development problem stemming from an interdisciplinary collaboration between three to five enrolled master students from anywhere in the world.
Details
GENEVA CHALLENGE 2025
THE CHALLENGES OF MIGRATION
The world is currently experiencing one of the largest waves of migration in history. In 2020, over 280 million individuals (or 3.6% of the world’s population) lived outside their country of birth. Meanwhile, migration occurs within a country's borders.
The number of people forcibly displaced by conflict, persecution, and climate-related disasters has increased over the past decades, reaching 122.6 million in 2024. Among them, 43.7 million are formally recognised as refugees. The vast majority of refugees, around 71%, is hosted by low- and middle-income countries that often face significant challenges in meeting the needs of their own populations. Just as voluntary migration occurs within a country's borders, so does forced displacement, referred to as internal displacement. In 2024, the 72.1 million internally displaced people made up more than half of all forcibly displaced people globally.
Migration is an integral part of human history, shaping economies, cultures, and societies across the globe. However, migration also presents complex challenges. In addition to affecting the migrants themselves, it also affects the host countries that receive them and the sending countries they leave behind. Thus, the challenges of migration require innovative solutions that turn these challenges into opportunities.
We hope that graduate students from around the world will embrace the opportunity to devise innovative solutions for these many challenges, taking an interdisciplinary approach to tackle the pressing issues of migration.
- Registration deadline: 30 April 2025 at 23:59 CET.
- Submission deadline: 16 July 2025 at 23:59 CET.
Opportunity is About
Eligibility
Candidates should be from:
Description of Ideal Candidate
Eligibility:
- 1.1. Participants of the ADG contest 2025 must be enrolled as graduate students at the time of their registration for the contest.
- 1.1.1. We consider “graduate students” to be anyone enrolled in a post bachelor level university programme with a maximum duration of 2 (two) years, or anyone who can prove to be studying towards acquiring a masters level degree.
- 1.2. Participants must gather in teams of 3 (three) to 5 (five) graduate students, who are able to contribute from at least 2 (two) different disciplinary perspectives to the submitted analysis.
- 1.2.1 No participation on an individual basis will be admitted.
- 1.2.2 The participants can be enrolled in a same graduate programme, collaborate with students from other programmes from the university they are enrolled in or coordinate with students from different universities and institutions worldwide.
- 1.2.3 The category in which the team will be placed for the contest will be based on the continent of the universities predominantly represented within the team.
- 1.2.3.1 In case, there is an equal representation of continents within the team, the team decides in which category they wish to compete.
- 1.3. All team members must provide a scanned copy of a document that serves as proof of enrolment as a graduate student before the registration of the team can be confirmed and validated.
- 1.3.1. Any official document issued by the academic institution the student is affiliated to is accepted as proof of enrolment as long as it contains:
- a) The name of the student;
- b) The program he/she is enrolled in;
- c) An issuance date up to three months before the registration date or
- d) Validity beyond the registration date
- 1.4. Exceptionally, we might accept the registration of students who are transitioning into graduate studies, as long as they have already been accepted in a graduate student programme at the time of the registration.
Dates
Deadline: April 30, 2025
Cost/funding for participants
Prizes
The ADG contest distributes 25,000 CHF in monetary prizes. The winning project will be awarded CHF 10,000; the two teams in second place will receive CHF 5,000 each and the two teams in third place, CHF 2,500 each.
Un-save Opportunity
Internships, scholarships, student conferences and competitions.
