This year’s competition drew a record 312 participants from 13 universities, with 62 judges completing the first-round evaluations. A group of 13 finals judges is now reviewing the finalists to determine the top award recipients. We are deeply grateful to all these volunteers for their generosity of time and for helping make this competition a success.

A list of finalists appears below. Warm congratulations to the 13 finalist teams on their exceptional submissions, and sincere congratulations to all participants for your thoughtful fact sheets and compelling ideas. The competition was especially strong this year. Your work is both inspiring and forward-looking, and we hope you will continue to develop these ideas in pursuit of a more sustainable future.

The 13 finalist teams will briefly present their projects on Saturday, December 6, 2025, between 10:00 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. (U.S. Central Time).  The ceremony will be held entirely on Zoom to accommodate our many participating institutions.

FINALISTS IN THE 2025 REIMAGINE OUR FUTURE COMPETITION
(In alphabetical order of the team leaders’ last names)

Anastasiia Albut, Kseniia Zviahintseva, Anastasiia Lichna – International Humanitarian University Ukraine

Andrea Jimena Arias-Diaz, Ricardo Robles-Fletes – National Autonomous University of Mexico  

Isabella Bird, Katie Kan, Emily Herbst – University of Birmingham

Briana Harris, Kevin Bustamante – Waubonsee Community College

Matthew Kwong, Isaiah Kim, Amina Mandzukic, Aarushi Tiwari, Kaushal Siruvuri, Lionel Yan, Andrew Low, Adi Jha – University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Henna Naveed – University of Birmingham

Tricia Newman – University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Angel Ofori-amanfo, Victory Ndibe-Onwuka, Elohor Oghorodi, Lukas Akyildiz – University of Birmingham

Akhil Raizada, Logan Justiniani, Anna Aler, Arush Chatterjee, Arnav Pande, Gianna Niecestro, Sarina Shah, Jack Visnjevac – University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Brooke Rember, Olivia Fleury, Niamh Mclaren-Moreton, Phoebe Hill, Emily Thomas – University of Birmingham

Zaara Tariq Saeed, George Hodgson-Wilde, Xiaojie Deng, Julia Thornton – University of Birmingham

Ayush Thaker, Vidipta Roy, SaarthakJain, Marcus Lam – University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign  

Crystal Zhao, Marlo Decapo, Valeria Echavarri, Yashwanth Nagarajan, Torin Schroeder – University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign