March 20, 2004 Newsletter

1. Judging
A panel of 63 judges has been busy reviewing the selected projects and their decisions concerning finalists will be announced on April 14th. The names of all finalists will appear on the challenge website ( http://www.uaechallenge.com ) and we will contact all the finalists advising them of the decisions.

We are asking all finalists to send us a CV, as a number of sponsor companies have expressed interest in offering internships to a selected number of finalists. After the finalists have sent us their CV's, the sponsor companies will read them and then decide who to interview and contact the finalists directly. So please, start preparing your CV's and if you are a finalist, you will be asked to send it to us.

2. Sponsors - Intel joins the IT Challenge
We are pleased to announce that Intel (Support Sponsor) has joined the UAE IT Challenge, and look forward to their involvement in this years programme.

3. The Stockholm Challenge
The Stockholm challenge event program is available on the website at http://www.challenge.stockholm.se/

This annual event will showcase leading IT projects on May 10/11 with the award ceremony to be held on May 13th in the Nobel Hall, Stockholm.

4. The Rome Global Junior Challenge
Entries to the Global Junior Challenge close on 30th June 2004. We strongly encourage project authors to enter their projects into this world competition. More information is found online at http://www.gjc.it/2004/index.asp

5. Preparations for April 25th Event Day
Planning has been underway for some time now for the event day of April 25th. Finalists will be invited to showcase their projects, and we are inviting students and teachers throughout the UAE to come along and view the projects and meet the finalists.

Belinda Palubiski has been appointed as Bussing Coordinator for the event day, and will manage the thousands of visitors expected to attend the project exhibition. If you are a teacher or student and wish to bring a group along, please contact Belinda at belinda.palubiski@hct.ac.ae for more information and suggested timings.

Entrance is free, and we will be giving away several interesting prizes as well for those that attend.

6. Jumeirah Beach Hotel Competition - Question 2
The Jumeirah Beach Hotel (JBH) has kindly presented the IT Challenge with TWO vouchers for dinner (2 persons) and soft drinks at one of its restuarants. These vouchers are valid till 8th August 2004.

The competition is only open to those people who have entered the UAE Educational IT Challenge!

To find the answer to this weeks question, you need to go to the website of JBH. Once you have all the answers, we will give details in the last newsletter about how to send us the answers. You will need to send us other information that you included in your project entry, such as Name, email address, phone number, project ID, PO Box number etc so we can verify your entry.

The two lucky winners will be drawn on April 20th and contacted by phone.

The question for this week is: Each room is a minimum of how many square meters? Is it 20, 45, 50, 60 or 65 square meters.

The answer is found on the Jumeirah Beach Hotel website at http://www.jumeirahbeachhotel.com/

7. Upcoming Events
April 14 - Announcement of Finalists
April 24 - Setup of finalist projects
April 25 - Project Exhibition, Award Ceremony and Gala Dinner
May 11-13 Stockholm Challenge
May Post Events