B4DPA: Innovation in Public Administration Competition Returns
University students from all over the world, unite (in groups) and think about how to transform and promote innovation in Italian public administration. Registration is now open for the second edition of the B4DPA – Bocconi for Digital Public Administration Award, a competition promoted by Bocconi along with Diego Piacentini, the Digital Transformation Team of the Italian Government and Roberta Cocco, the Milan City Council Member for Digital Transformation. The competition, which is open to groups of students in Bachelor of Science, Master of Science, Specialized Master and Post-Experience programs at Italian and international universities, will award a cash prize of €35,000 to the winning project to develop their idea. In addition, the commission may also award a group by giving each member the opportunity to participate in one of the four concentrations of the Master of Public Administration at SDA Bocconi School of Management in spring 2019.
The competition's goal is to provide solutions for innovating Italian PA. There are two options for projects: to suggest agile solutions to known problems in public administration or to propose radical transformations to redefine the PA of the future. Groups of 3-5 members from any university can participate, as long as the group representative is enrolled in a Bocconi degree course (BSc or MSc), in a SDA Bocconi Specialized Master or in the PhD School (the complete regulations are available here).
After the group's pre-registration (which the representative completes by filling out this registration form), participants have until 30 November 2018 to submit their idea. Submissions must include a press release that explains to citizens the impact of their project, and a document that explains the project's objectives, content, expected results and timeline.
Several of the submitted projects will be selected for the second phase of the competition, announced by 20 December 2018. In phase 2, Bocconi faculty or industry experts will assist the selected groups in refining and developing their proposal to then present the final project by 28 February 2019. The winners will be announced by the end of March 2019. The commission will select the winners based on the impact of the project for stakeholders in the public sector and its actual contribution to transforming public administration.
Like last edition, there is once again a B4DPA Facebook group for the 2018-2019 edition.