Top 20 Competitions for High School Students in 2022-2023
Whether you’re a high-performing high school student looking to showcase your academic ability or a high schooler interested in exploring a field of interest more deeply, academic competitions are a great way of challenging yourself to solve difficult problems while developing your skill profile along the way.
In this blog post, we will cover 20 different academic and project-based competitions for high school students that span a wide range of disciplines, from history to computer science. For a more focused list on STEM competitions for high schoolers, check out our previous blog post. Or, if you are looking to prepare for a specific project-based competition, learn how to get started on your own research here.
Interested in applying a coding or data science approach to your contest submission? Find out how YOU can apply artificial intelligence to the subjects that interest you in Inspirit AI’s AI Scholars Program.
20 Competitions for High Schoolers
1. International Space Settlement Design Competition
Teams of students work together to design space settlements and produce a 40-page written proposal to be delivered at their regional semi-final in April. The competition emulates, as closely as possible, the experience of working as a member of an aerospace industry proposal team.
Students can register as individuals or in teams to compete in their regional semi-final in the U.S. and Canada or in the international qualifying competition. Semi-finals are held for the southwest, northwest, and east coast regions of the U.S.
2. Conrad Challenge
In the Conrad Challenge, high school students go step-by-step through the entrepreneurial process and design an innovation that solves an important problem. The competition is broken up into four stages––activation, lean canvas, innovation, and power pitch––through which students gain experience in ideation, implementation, and presentation of STEM discovery.
Challenge categories include aerospace & aviation, cyber-technology & security, energy & environment, and health & nutrition. Outstanding teams in each category are named Conrad Innovators and the top teams are named Pete Conrad Scholars.
3. NATIONAL ACADEMIC LEAGUE
The NAL season runs from October to February, spanning four different competition varieties––roundabout, teamwork, problem solving, and one-on-one––ahead of the National Tournament played from March to April. The NAL question bank covers 22 subjects grouped under the areas of math, English/language arts, science, and social studies. Championships are awarded at the local, regional, and national levels.
4. NAQT High School National Championship Tournament
Held at the end of each academic year, the HSNCT is the premier high school competition of National Academic Quiz Tournaments, LLC. Top quiz bowl teams from across the U.S. and around the world compete at the end of May for the honor of being crowned national champions. The 2023 HSNCT will take place at the Atlanta Marriott Marquis and Hilton Atlanta from May 26-28.
5. Questions Unlimited National Academic Championship
Focusing on academic information––“significa” rather than “trivia”––QU’s National Academic Championship is held in June for qualifying teams that placed in the top 15% of their local or regional academic competition. Preliminary rounds are staged from May-June and are conducted both virtually and in-person in New Orleans and Chicago.
Each team competing in prelims is guaranteed at least six matches and must win at least four to advance to the playoffs. The playoffs are all virtual and determine the national champion in single elimination style. High school students can organize teams at their schools and participate locally or virtually in preliminary events.
6. Academic Decathlon
High schoolers can participate in this prestigious national competition either by forming teams or by entering the individual competition. The subject areas that are tested at the USAD are art, economics, literature, mathematics, music, science, and social science.
As its name suggests, the contest features ten different events that will involve answering multiple-choice questions, giving speeches, responding to interview questions, and writing essays, among other academic tasks. For the individual version of the competition, students compete online in eight of the ten original events.
7. National History Bowl
The National History Bowl is a buzzer-based quiz contest for teams of up to six students. The high school level of the competition features two divisions, varsity (11th-12th grade) and junior varsity (9th-10th grade). At regional History Bowls held on weekends, the game format consists of five preliminary rounds that each take about 30-40 min. Teams will qualify for the National Championships by owning at least a .500 winning percentage or by winning a playoff match.
8. University Interscholastic League
Self-proclaimed as the most comprehensive program of academic competition in the U.S., the UIL offers 30 contests at the high school level, ranging over subjects such as:
Accounting
Calculator applications
Computer science
Current issues & events
Essay writing
Mathematics
Number Sense
Robotics
UIL is based out of Texas and affiliated with the University of Texas at Austin.
9. Microsoft Imagine Cup
At over two million participants over the past 21 years, the Microsoft Imagine Cup is one of the most popular high school academic competitions in the world. The mission of Imagine Cup is to encourage students to shape the world, build up their skills, and realize their passions.
As far as the competition itself, the Imagine Cup Competition seeks to honor the most innovative, accessible, ground-breaking software developed with Microsoft tools and technology. The contest may be structured differently based on students’ country or region and the dates of local events will also vary, while online semifinals are held from November 2022 to January 2023. The World Finals and Championship span from March-May 2023.
10. spUN Debate Program of the National Space Society (NSS)
In 2017, the NSS International Space Development Conference (ISDC) gave birth to the space policy and Universalization (spUN) Debates, now in their sixth year. The high school program is 100% virtual and creates an environment for students from around the world to appreciate different perspectives, cultures, and languages as they learn the art of debating.
The application deadline for the 2022-2023 season is December 15 and the final debate round is scheduled for the end of May.
11. Space Settlement Contest
Another competition sponsored by the National Space Society, the space settlement contest hosts categories for individuals, small teams of two to five, and large teams of six to twelve. Contestants make submissions about free space settlements limited to 50 pages maximum. The submission deadline for the current academic year is February 15.
12. Harvard/MIT Mathematics Tournament (HMMT)
Founded in 1998, HMMT is one of the most prestigious high school competitions in the world. The tournament is entirely student-organized by students from Harvard and MIT and draws close to 1000 students each contest, including top scorers at national and international olympiads. The upcoming HMMT will be held at MIT on February 18.
13. U.S. National Chemistry Olympiad
The USNCO program has four stages for high school students. The season starts with local exams in March and proceeds to national exams in April. The top 20 scoring students from the National Exam spend two weeks at a study camp in June to undergo rigorous training in preparation for the international chemistry olympiad. Based on their performance at the study camp, four students are chosen to represent the U.S. on the international stage.
14. Math League High School Contests CONTESTS
Math League runs more than 400 contests each year, reaching over 30,000 students across all age ranges. The high school program consists of a series of contests held throughout the school year, culminating in a national and international championship. Top-scoring students in qualifying rounds are invited to compete in their state championship competition held in April. Winners of each state competition are invited to the U.S. National High School Championship in May.
15. Best Robotics Competition
BEST (Boosting Engineering, Science & Technology) has created two competition formats in addition to its classic head-to-head robot contest, namely a classroom time trial format and an online virtual robot competition. BEST events typically consist of a kickoff day, practice day, game day, and championship. The emphasis of the competition is on complete product development, considering disciplines of engineering, finance, marketing in the judging process.
16. Congressional App Challenge
The Congressional App Challenge is the most prestigious prize in high school computer science. Part of this prestige comes from the competition’s impact on transforming how Congress views computer science and STEM. Students can use any programming language including C, C++, JavaScript, Python, Ruby, and others as well as any platform with no limits on application theme or topic. High schoolers can learn to code from a number of CAC sponsors or from InspiritAI’s top-rated AI Scholars program.
17. DECA Competitive Events
Formerly called Distributive Education Clubs of America, DECA aligns its competitive events with its National Curriculum Standards in marketing, business management and administration, finance, and hospitality and tourism. DECA’s evaluation process involves students in both a written component such as an exam or report and an interactive component with an industry professional serving as judge. DECA prizes its competitions for directly contributing to college and career preparation for high school students.
18. USA Computing OlympaidLYMPIAD
As a stepping stone to the International Olympiad in Informatics (IOI), the most prestigious international algorithmic programming competition for high schoolers, USACO supports computing education by training high school students to develop and compete in computing skills. Roughly six online programming contests are held each year, as well as an intensive summer training camp, to which top U.S. students are invited to learn advanced material and further improve their skills.
19. Technology Student Association (TSA) High School Competitions
TSA offers 40 high school competitions in over 30 categories. Some of the topics include:
Animatronics
Architectural Design
Board Game Design
Coding
Digital Video Production
Forensic Science
Geospatial Technology
Software Development
Virtual Reality Visualization
See the website above for eligibility requirements and instructions for each individual contest.
20. IGEM
The International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) hosts a grand jamboree each year, fielding synthetic biology projects from 40+ different countries. The 2022 iGEM jamboree was held in Paris with 173 teams earning gold medals. To participate, students can search projects using the Phoenix Project search tool before recruiting a multidisciplinary team to address their chosen topic.
Prizes are awarded for the best and runner-up high school projects, in addition to track awards presented in categories such as therapeutics, climate crisis, food & nutrition, and energy.
