SUMMARY

The finest feature of the World Affairs Challenge is how it provides an opportunity for students to apply a wide range of skills and interests within a very simple framework.

Centered on an overarching theme that confronts the international community, the Challenge offers four separate elements within one program, each of which engages a different set of skills and talents from the teams involved.

Here is a description of the competition events:

The Formal Presentation is a 15 minute combination of public presentation and performance in which participating teams bring an aspect of the Challenge topic creatively to life for a panel of judges.

The Discovery Poster helps teams develop skills of formulating, organizing and concisely presenting the most relevant and important information pertaining to their Formal Presentation topic in the visual form of a poster.

The Collaborative Question fosters team building, higher-level thinking, leadership skills, and persuasive presentation in an exciting process of working with peers to address a particular question associated with the annual Challenge theme.

The Global Awareness Quiz emphasizes traditional academic skills and world awareness in the form of a paper and pencil 50 question test.

Through these four diverse elements, the World Affairs Challenge allows students with a variety of skills and backgrounds to come together as representatives of their schools while increasing their awareness of fundamental issues facing the global community.

For further information about how to organize a team at your local high school or middle school, please contact the Center for Teaching International Relations (CTIR) at the Graduate School of International Studies, University of Denver, at 303-871-7442, through this site, or via ebeindor@du.edu.