STEM Superhero Challenge

In the STEM Superhero Challenge, you have the opportunity to recognize someone who has personally inspired your interest in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math). By telling your hero’s story and passing down any lessons learned along the way, you can share that same inspiration with the rest of the world and help inspire the next generation of diverse, talented individuals to pursue a rewarding STEM career. You could also win a cash prize and the chance to meet some of the real-life STEM heroes at Regeneron who help solve the human body’s complex mysteries.

Regeneron and Base 11, the Challenge Sponsors, are committed to helping empower our future STEM workforce by creating a platform for a new wave of inspirational and relatable STEM role models, showcasing them as the unseen heroes of our world.

Your participation in this challenge is essential to this mission! Tell us about your hero, why they inspired your interest in STEM, and what lessons they shared that might assist others on their own journeys. 

History has taught us that people feel empowered to succeed when they see someone they identify with excelling in their own way while still having a valuable impact. For this reason, we are especially interested in hearing about the everyday, unsung STEM heroes who personally inspired you. Don’t underestimate the value that a relatable, down-to-earth role model can have on the world! Oftentimes their impact extends beyond their professional work alone.

Don't miss your chance to be a part of this community that supports and encourages diversity in STEM!

Background

In the way that an orchestra can only reach its full potential when it employs a variety of instruments and diverse music styles, so too does every industry, organization, and community truly excel only when they leverage the full power of their diverse talent pool.

In the same spirit, Regeneron knows that scientific inquiry and technological advancements are especially fruitful when scientists naturally approach a problem from different angles. This is because scientists bring their unique experiences and knowledge to the table. Thus, Regeneron is joining Base 11 in the mission to help make STEM careers more accessible to people from all walks of life and especially to the communities that lack established pipelines into these fields. The STEM Superhero Challenge supports this mission by showcasing and celebrating a new wave of STEM role models.

The Challenge

Your role in the STEM Superhero Challenge is to profile an individual who you consider to be a STEM superhero. Your chosen hero should be someone you personally know or knew and someone who inspired you to become more involved in a STEM career or subject. Tell us about your hero, why they inspired your interest in STEM, and what lessons they imparted on you that might assist others on their journeys. 

Note that you will have to attain your hero’s permission before submitting their story to this challenge and you must be able to submit evidence of this agreement in the form of a signed legal release, if you are selected as a finalist.

Here are some examples of the types of people you could profile:

• Colleagues or mentors who have provided guidance and support in your academic and/or professional journey.
• A family member or close friend who has motivated you to pursue further studies on a particular STEM topic.
• A friend who has excelled in their STEM career, perhaps even someone who found success despite the challenges they faced along the way.
  • Excelling in a STEM career can also be seen as having a meaningful impact on an issue that is important to your hero or just having a deep impact in their community. Achieving a high-ranking position isn’t the only way to excel!
• Your hero does not need to work in STEM themselves to be a STEM superhero.
  • We want to hear about ordinary and extraordinary people alike.
  • That means your hero could even be a parent, a sibling, etc.
• Your hero can even be someone you knew but who is no longer alive, as long as you can take their insights and adapt them to the present day.

Be sure to check out the Resources section for tools that can help you learn more about your hero, if you need additional information to complete your submission.

How do I Win?

To be eligible for an award, your proposal must, at minimum:

• Thoughtfully address the Submission Form questions.
• Satisfy the Judging Criteria requirements.
• Be scored higher than your competitors!

 Submission Form

1. Questions to confirm your eligibility.
2. Tell us the story of your STEM hero. (3500 characters)
   1. Why do you find them inspirational? In what way have they inspired you to delve deeper into a STEM topic or career?
   2. If your hero worked in a STEM job, what kind of impact did they have on their field? Or more generally, what kind of impact did your hero leave on their community? 
   3. Feel free to tell this story in the style you prefer, but take a look at the Judging Criteria section below to note how your entry will be scored. These submission fields allow you to insert images.
3. Now tell us about the takeaways and insights you learned from your hero. (2000 characters) 
   1. For example, if your hero worked in a STEM field, what strategies, habits, programs, support networks, or resources helped them to overcome adversity and be successful? To what do they credit their success? 
   2. Or more broadly, what have been the most influential insights for you in your own journey? 
4. Finally, what lessons from your hero’s story can be adapted for the benefit of people from different backgrounds? (2000 characters)
   1. For example, if one factor in your hero’s success story is that a mentor helped them with networking early in their career, how might that advice be adapted for someone who does not have access to a mentor or to a professional network? Is there another way that this resource could be made more equitable? E.g. Can you find any organizations that connect young people to career mentors?
   2. Share how the insights you gathered from your hero might be made more applicable to a diverse audience.
5. (Optional) You may also provide a URL link to an online profile of your chosen hero, if they have one. For example, this could be a public LinkedIn page, a university faculty profile page, or an “about me” section on their company’s website.
6. Please also provide a brief summary of your submission and a relevant photograph that can be shared with the public if your submission is selected as a finalist. Please ensure that this is information you are comfortable sharing with the public as it may be used during the public voting stage and to announce the final challenge winners. (500 characters + image upload)

Judging Criteria

In addition, competitors being considered for an award (Finalists) will be asked to attend a brief video call with the challenge judging panel around May 23 to May 26, 2023. The judges would like the opportunity to meet some of the competitors, to learn more about their hero’s story, and to ask follow-up questions.

Prizes

Judges Award: At least 5 and up to 10 eligible winners will share in a $9,500 prize purse.* 

Up to 5 of these awardees will also be named Grand Prize winners and will be invited to attend a sponsored trip to Regeneron, where they will have a chance to meet with real-life STEM heroes, learn about job opportunities, and network with their fellow challenge winners.

People’s Choice Award: Submissions awarded by the judges will be eligible for a people’s choice award. The submission with the highest votes will receive an additional $500.

*All monetary awards will be distributed to the participant who submitted the challenge entry. The Challenge Sponsors reserve the right to redistribute the prize amounts laid out in these guidelines if there are not enough eligible submissions.

Timeline

Rules

Participation Eligibility:

The Challenge is open to all legal residents of the 50 United States and the District of Columbia who are at least 18 years of age or the age of majority in their state of residence, whichever is older, and who are at most 34 years of age. Submissions can be made by individuals who are residents of the United States. Submissions must be made in English. All Challenge-related communication will be in English.

Individuals and teams should not be representing a for-profit business. 

Employees of Regeneron, Base 11, HeroX, their affiliated companies, subsidiaries, vendors, agencies, and the immediate family members and members of the same residing in the household of any of the above are not eligible to enter or win.

To be eligible to compete, you must comply with all the terms of the Challenge as defined in the Challenge-Specific Agreement (collectively, these “Official Rules”).

Registration and Submissions:

Submissions must be made online (only), via upload to the HeroX.com website, on or before the Submission Deadline (see Timeline here[1] ). No late Submissions will be accepted.

This Challenge allows a maximum of one (1) Submission per individual.

By submitting a Submission you warrant and represent that it: (a) is your original work, (b) has not been previously published, (c) has not won previous awards, (d) does not infringe upon the copyrights, trademarks, privacy rights, publicity or other intellectual property or other rights of any person or entity; (e) that you have obtained permission from individuals whose name, likeness,  voice or other personal data you include in the Submission, to share their personal data in this way (you may be asked to submit evidence for this in the form of a documented legal release), and (f) and that publication of the Submission via various media, will not infringe on the rights of any third party rights. Any such entrant will indemnify and hold harmless, Sponsor from any claims to the contrary.  Any entrant whose Submission includes likenesses of third parties or contains elements not owned by the entrant (such as, but not limited to, depictions of persons, buildings, trademarks or logos) must be able to provide legal releases for such use including Sponsor’s use of such Submission, in a form satisfactory to administrator, upon request, prior to award of prize and/or naming of entrant as a winner.

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All Submissions must comply with the following requirements:

1. Submissions must not contain material that violates or infringes another’s rights, including without limitation, intellectual property rights infringement, privacy, or publicity;

2. Submissions must not disparage or adversely affect the name, brand image, reputation or goodwill of Sponsor or any other person or party affiliated with the Challenge;

3. Submissions must have permission from all individuals that appear or are referenced in any Submissions (if any) to use their name, likeness or other personal data and to grant the rights set forth herein;

4. Submissions must not contain any viruses, worms, spy ware, or other components or instructions that are malicious, deceptive, or designed to limit or harm the functionality of a computer;  

5. Submissions must not contain material that is inappropriate, indecent, obscene hateful, tortious, defamatory, slanderous or libelous;

6. Submissions must not contain material that promotes bigotry, racism, hatred or harm against any group or individual or promotes discrimination based on race, gender, religion, nationality, disability, sexual orientation or age; and

7. Submissions must not contain material that is unlawful or describes or depicts any unlawful activity.

Judging

The judging panel will be composed of Regeneron and Base 11 employees with expertise in advancing equal access to STEM careers.

No information regarding judging deliberations or selections will be disclosed.

Intellectual Property Rights:

As detailed in the Challenge-Specific Agreement, if Challenge Sponsor notifies Innovator that Submission is eligible for a Prize, Innovator will be considered qualified as a finalist (“Finalist”). If Finalist accepts the prize they are offered, the Finalist must grant Sponsor and its agents an unlimited, worldwide, perpetual, license and right to publish, use, publicly perform the Submission in any way, in any and all media, without limitation, and without consideration to the entrant. Except where prohibited by law, each winner grants (and agrees to confirm this grant in writing, if requested) permission for Sponsor and those acting under its authority to use his/her name, photograph, voice and/or likeness, for advertising and/or publicity purposes in any and all media now known or hereinafter invented without territorial or time limitations and without compensation. 

Awarding of the Prize:

Winners will be posted on the Innovator Challenge website -  [herox.com/STEMSuperhero].

The Individual Submitter is automatically designated as the Recipient of the prize monies. The Individual’s name must also match the Authorized Person on the receiving Bank Account . No changes are permitted to the prize Recipient after the Submission Deadline date. Prizes are non-transferable,  Prize recipient cannot assign the payments.  Winners are only entitled to the awarded Prize. Potential winners are subject to verification, including verification of age.  If a potential winner is found not to be eligible or not in compliance with these Official Rules, or if any prize is returned as  undeliverable, the potential winner will be disqualified.  In the event that a potential winner is disqualified for any reason, Sponsor reserves the right to award the prize to an alternate entrant who will also be selected at the Judges’ discretion, even if the disqualified potential winner’s name may have been publicly announced.  Sponsor is not responsible for any change of email address, mailing address and/or telephone number of entrants.

Taxes:

Prize winners will be solely responsible for all federal, state and/or local taxes, and for any other fees or costs associated with the prizes they receive, regardless of whether it, in whole or in part, are used.

Privacy:

Please see the privacy policy located at https://www.regeneron.com/privacy-policy for details of Sponsor's policy regarding the processing of personal data in connection with this Challenge.  If you are selected as a winner, your information may also be included in a publicly-available winner’s list. 

Please see the HeroX privacy policy at this address: https://www.herox.com/privacy-policy

Additional Information

• By participating in the challenge, each competitor agrees to adhere to the HeroX Intellectual Integrity Policy and promises to submit only their original idea. Any indication of "copying" amongst competitors is grounds for disqualification.
• All applications will go through a process of due diligence; any application found to be misrepresentative, plagiarized, or sharing an idea that is not their own will be automatically disqualified.
• All ineligible applicants will be automatically removed from the competition with no recourse.
• No purchase or payment of any kind is necessary to enter or win the competition.
• Void wherever restricted or prohibited by law.

Sponsor reserves the right, in its sole discretion to cancel or suspend this Challenge should fraud, virus, bugs or other causes beyond the control of Sponsor corrupt the administration of the Challenge.  Sponsor is not responsible for computer system, phone line, hardware, software or program malfunctions, or other errors, failures or delays in computer transmissions or network connections that are human or technical in nature.  Sponsor reserves the right at its sole discretion, to disqualify any individual (and all of his or her entries) who tampers with the entry process.  Participants may not register with multiple email addresses nor may entrants use any other device or artifice to register multiple times or as multiple registrants. Any Participant who attempts to enter with multiple email addresses under multiple identities or uses any device or artifice to register/play multiple times will be disqualified and forfeits any and all prizes won, in Sponsor's discretion.  Judges’ decisions are final in all matter relating to this Challenge.

Limitations of Liability and Release:

As a condition of entering, entrants (or their parent or legal guardian if an eligible minor) agree (and agree to confirm in writing): (a) to release Sponsor, its affiliates, subsidiaries, retailers, sales representatives, distributors and each of their officers, directors, employees and agents (“Challenge Parties”), from any and all liability, loss or damage incurred with respect to the awarding, receipt, possession, and/or use or misuse of any prize, including any traveling related thereto (b) under no circumstances will entrant be permitted to obtain awards for, and participant hereby waives all rights to claim, punitive, incidental, consequential, or any other damages, other than for actual out-of-pocket expenses; (c) all causes of action arising out of or connected with this Challenge, or any prize awarded, shall be resolved individually, without resort to any form of class action; and (d) any and all claims, judgments, and award shall be limited to actual out-of-pocket costs incurred, excluding attorneys’ fees and court costs.   These Official Rules and the Challenge are governed by US law and are subject to all applicable federal, state and local laws and regulations. All issues and questions concerning the construction, validity, interpretation and enforceability of the Official Rules, or the rights and obligations of each entrant and Sponsor in connection with the Challenge, shall be governed by, and construed in accordance with, the laws of the State  of New York, U.S.A., without giving effect to the conflict of laws rules thereof, and any matters or proceedings shall take place in the State of New York.

Winners List:

The Winners will be announced and listed on the Innovator Challenge website – herox.com/STEMSuperhero.