A team of six representing The University of the West Indies, Mona will be leaving on Wednesday March 11th, to compete at the sixth annual Hult Prize. The annual Hult Prize Challenge is the world’s largest student competition and start-up platform for social good. In partnership with President Bill Clinton and the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI); the innovative crowd-sourcing platform identifies and launches catalytic social ventures that aim to solve the planet’s most pressing challenges. Student teams compete for a chance to secure USD1 million in start-up funding to launch a sustainable social venture.  The Hult Prize, funded by the Hult family, has been named by TIME amongst the top five ideas changing the world.


The Hult Prize regional final competitions will take place on March 13 and 14, 2015 in Boston, San Francisco, London, Dubai and Shanghai. Team UWI Mona will compete in Boston.


Team UWI will be up against teams from Brown University, Columbia University, Cornell University, Duke University, Harvard University, Johns Hopkins, MIT, Princeton University, Yale University and several other top-tier schools. The team members are Latoya Thompson-Hall  and Joan White  recent MBA graduate  and MBA  student  respectively  from the Mona School of Business and Management (MBSM); Travis Atkinson graduate student from the Department of Economics; Michelle Ann Humphrey, postgraduate student, Faculty of Humanities and Education. The team is supported by  Lashana Whyte an MBA graduate of Mona School of Business and Management and Olivia Johnson-Wilmot post graduate student from the Faculty of Humanities and Education.


Faculty advisors include Professor Maureen Samms-Vaughan, Department of Child and Adolescent Health; Dr. Peter-John Gordon, Department of Economics and Prof. Densil Williams, Douglas Lindo and Janice Henlin from the Mona School of Business and Management.  Professor Samms-Vaughan noted that finding solutions for accessible and affordable early childhood development will be the determinant of the future of countries such as Jamaica and, indeed, the world.


Principal Archibald McDonald has congratulated the UWI Mona Team on their success and has stated "Once again, UWI has shown that it ranks among the best universities in the world".  Minister of Education, Hon. Ronald Thwaites, under whose portfolio early childhood development falls, has also extended his congratulations to the UWI team and faculty advisors. "We wish the team success and hope that its participation will result in the development of a model for the sustainable operation of Early Childhood Institutions in Jamaica", said Minister Thwaites.


Each of the 250 teams selected in January 2015 was chosen from more than 20,000 applications received from over 500 colleges and universities in over 150 countries.
This year’s challenge was selected and set by President Bill Clinton, who said, “The Hult Prize is about more than the solution to the problem, it’s about how the world has to work in the 21st century.”  The 2015 Hult Prize will focus on building start-ups that provide sustainable, high quality early education solutions to ten million children under the age of six in urban slums and beyond by the year 2020.


Ahmad Ashkar, CEO and Founder of the Hult Prize Foundation, attributes the rapid growth of the Socially Responsive Investment sector to new demand being created by the international market place. “Servicing the world’s poorest through profitable and sustainable enterprise is not just good for the world, its great business.” “Our pioneering platform builds ecosystems by leveraging crowd and we couldn’t be happier that Team UWI, Mona will be joining our mission with their participation in the 6th annual Hult Prize.”



Following the regional finals, one winning team from each host city will move into a summer business incubator, where participants will receive mentorship, advisory and strategic planning as they create prototypes and set-up to launch and scale their new ventures. A final round of competition will be hosted by President Bill Clinton and the Clinton Global Initiative at its annual meeting in September, where CGI delegates will select a winning team, which will be awarded the USD1 million Prize by President Bill Clinton himself.



About the Hult Prize Foundation

The Hult Prize Foundation is a pioneer in crowd-based approaches to the development of entrepreneurial ecosystems and the acceleration of social enterprise. Its start-up accelerator brings together the brightest college and university students from around the globe to solve the world’s most pressing issues. It has been named by TIME amongst the top five ideas changing the world. The annual Hult Prize Challenge is the world’s largest student competition and crowd-sourcing platform for social good. The Hult Prize Foundation has been funded by the Hult family since it was founded in 2009 by current CEO, Ahmad Ashkar. To learn more, visit www.hultprize.org.


About The Clinton Global Initiative

Established in 2005 by President Bill Clinton, the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI), an initiative of Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation, convenes global leaders to create and implement innovative solutions to the world’s most pressing challenges. CGI Annual Meetings have brought together more than 150 heads of state, 20 Nobel Prize laureates, and hundreds of leading CEOs, heads of foundations and NGOs, major philanthropists, and members of the media. To date, CGI members have made more than 2,500 commitments, which are already improving the lives of more than 430 million people in over 180 countries. When fully funded and implemented, these commitments will be valued at $87.9 billion.