ManagEnergy Competition 2007 - Overview

Introduction

This year the ManagEnergy Drawing and Photo Competition was open to online entries and also entries generated by local energy agencies and others through a series of regional competitions. T-shirts and certificates were awarded to local winners, with the best entries from each region being forwarded to the overall Europewide competition. All 'appropriate' online entries were also submitted for final judging.

Entries

Between February and July 2007, ManagEnergy received hundreds of entries from across Europe. Photos were sent in by students aged 12-16 on a theme of sustainable energy and transport. While the drawings produced by younger children (6-11) included characters and scenes for ManagEnergy KidsCorner games. Overall the standard was extremely high, and the difficult task of picking a winner in each category fell to the ManagEnergy Reflection Group (MERG).

The judging process

The digital images (scans and photos) were optimised for the web and loaded onto an online database. Each each entry was identified by an anonymous reference number. MERG representatives (one from each Member State) were then invited to independently select their favourite 3 images in each category. The images with the highest number of votes were deemed to be the winners.

Regional Competitions

Behind every picture in the gallery there was an enthusiastic teacher and a dedicated energy professional inspiring an individual child to take part and change their attitude to energy.

The initial process involved Local Energy Actors contacting schools in their area by e-mail, letter and follow-up calls. Some local agencies contacted as many as 50 local schools, but only found one or two who were able to participate. This was generally because teachers were already committed to several other projects, and often required several months notice to fit new activities into a crowded school timetable.

When schools did want to join the competition, various steps had to be taken. Typically, the first step was to visit schools to provide background information on renewables, sustainable transport and energy efficiency and to brief teachers and children on the aims and rules of the competition.

Often ManagEnergy KidsCorner was presented on screen to give the children ideas and to introduce them to the online games. In Portugal, INESC Coimbra took this one step further by producing a booklet that incorporated pictures from the KidsCorner site and information on sustainable energy.

Judging and prizes

Once children had produced their artwork, a return visit to the school was generally required for judging. This process can be lengthy when there are 200 pictures or more to look through, and in many cases the energy agency and the schools joined forces to choose the winners.

Ronaldo the Reindeer T-shirts and certificates in several languages were provided by ManagEnergy, and several local organisers also added their own prizes. Most agencies held a special prize presentation (sometimes in conjunction with a wider energy fair or energy day) and arranged for media coverage from local newspapers.

Following regional judging, the best local images were scanned or photographed and submitted to the Europewide online competition, along with the name, age, and school details of each entrant.

Energy and dedication

The running of even a small competition is a significant exercise for a local energy agency. Many agencies only have 2 or 3 full-time members of staff, who share a multitude of other responsibilities.

Many of the agencies involved were already active in energy education. However, in every case the competitions were an additional task, carried out on a goodwill basis, and driven forward by individuals with a genuine passion for helping children learn about energy saving, renewable resources and climate change.

As indicated by the Galleries and the Presentations page, the efforts of the energy agencies really did make a difference - reaching hundreds of students and teachers in the UK, Denmark, Finland, Lithuania, Spain, Portugal, Romania and Serbia.

ManagEnergy extends a special thank you to all those colleagues whose energy and dedication made the regional competitions such a success!