NSF Career Compass Challenge Deadline Extended

SIOP Administrative Office

Agency Offering $100,000 for Workforce Self-Development Tools

The National Science Foundation has extended the deadline for part 1 of its Career Compass Challenge to 11:59 pm ET on January 7, 2019.

The NSF recognizes that, “The future of work is one of continuous change, which depends on a culture of continuous learning.” Therefore, the challenge is intended to develop tools allowing employees to match their skills and interests to work opportunities, and to train for those opportunities, as part of the NSF’s effort to help modernize the American workforce.

Participation in the challenge is open to all “solvers” and is structured in two parts. Interested parties may participate in one or both parts of the challenge.

The first part of the challenge has a purse of $25,000 and offers up to five $5,000 prizes for concept papers that “describe a solution to the challenge of continuous workforce reskilling and the desire for increased mobility.” 

Solvers are asked to think creatively about methods that go beyond the traditional "career path" thinking and "strategic workforce planning" methodology when exposing future skill needs or opportunities for an individual's consideration when choosing a development path.  Solvers are also asked to consider relevant research on adult cognition and reskilling, particularly for those that must "work" and "learn" simultaneously.

The second part of the competition is scheduled for February 25-June 28, 2019.  In this phase, solvers are invited to build upon the winning concepts from part 1 and build a working prototype of a solution for government testing and evaluation.

NSF wants to spark the thinking of the best and brightest to co-create a tool that can be tested on a small scale, for NSF, but is intended to be useful to a broad range of employers in both the public and private sectors. The general public, research communities, private sector and other interested stakeholders are invited to assist with creating a solution that will invest in the future of the U.S. workforce.

For more information on the NSF Career Compass Challenge, click here.

Questions? For questions about the challenge, please contact careercompasschallenge@nsf.gov.