How would you combat hunger anywhere in the world? Create affordable housing in a rural or urban community? Help the City of Chicago dig out from under its $35 billion pension debt?

Drafting a plan to tackle vexing questions like these isn’t everyone’s idea of fun. But for the University of Chicago undergraduate and graduate students who compete in policy challenges throughout the academic year, the events offer an opportunity to imagine novel solutions to local, national, and global issues.

More than 200 UChicago students participated in challenges organized by the Institute of Politics (IOP), the Harris School of Public Policy, Career Advancement, and other campus sponsors in 2024–25.

Jennifer Steinhauer, a senior director at the IOP, has a theory about why the contests attract students from varied majors and academic programs. “On a campus that is very, very rich with theoretical learning,” she says, “to do a real practical exercise, I think, is something that a lot of students crave.”

Policy challenges demand significant work outside the classroom. Fired up by a provocative prompt, small teams—usually two to five students—meet regularly to brainstorm solutions to a problem. Over several weeks (or months, depending on the competition), they analyze data and documents, talk to stakeholders and experts, and submit preliminary proposals. The top three or four teams are invited to present their ideas to judges in a final, public competition. Plans that combine creative thinking with a compelling narrative, clear financial data, and good graphics often prevail. Winners receive prize money and a plummy accomplishment for their résumés—and build their professional networks along the way.

Harris Public Policy’s annual Policy Innovation Challenge, which focuses on local issues, drew 90 participants in 2025. Organizer Justin Marlowe, a research professor who directs the school’s Center for Municipal Finance, sees the event primarily as an educational opportunity and “a twist on the kind of venture capital challenges that you see in business schools.”

In many business schools (and on the long-running TV show Shark Tank), entrepreneurs pitch their ideas to a panel of angel investors. Policy competitions borrow from that format while enabling wonkish students to deepen their understanding of complex, multifaceted public policy issues. And though the chance to split a $10,000 prize motivates many Harris team members, they also want to be recognized by their peers and industry professionals “for doing good work,” Marlowe says.

Here are highlights from four policy challenges that engaged UChicago students in 2024–25.

Lame ducks and DIY DOGE

Institute of Politics challenges are open to all UChicago students. Undergraduate teams have beaten out graduate student competitors more than once. Winning team members of the Spring Quarter 2025 competition received $500 each.

In Fall Quarter 2024, entrants had to create a piece of bipartisan legislation that could pass during a lame-duck session of Congress. Challenge winners Robbie Hlatki and Willa Wiley, both Class of 2027, proposed a pilot program to fund childcare services for families of first responders. Former US Senator Joe Manchin (I-WV) judged their pitch. “I think he appreciated our approach to practicality and bipartisanship,” says Hlatki, and “he was really judging us very rigorously, just like you would be in a Senate markup.”

In Spring Quarter 2025, students were asked to think like a do-it-yourself Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and suggest ideas to shrink the federal bureaucracy. The winning scheme, “Lean, Not Mean: Cutting Waste, Rewarding Results,” called for across-the-board cuts in departmental budgets, while redirecting part of the savings into an innovation fund that rewarded effective programs.

The students’ plan offered, “not just the stick of budget cuts but also the carrot of incentivizing people to cut on their own,” says Penelope Stinson, Class of 2027. Although IOP director and former US Senator Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND) peppered Stinson’s team with tough questions, she ultimately invited the students to edit their proposal so that she could potentially share it with members of Congress.

In February 2026 the IOP expects to bring teams from 30 colleges around the country to campus to compete in a policy challenge “super bowl” focusing on health care.

Supply-side solutions

The Kreisman Initiative for Housing Law and Policy—part of UChicago’s Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation—organized its inaugural policy challenge in spring 2025.

Noting the shortage of inexpensive housing for Chicago’s low-income renters, the competition asked students to describe where and how the city could create more than 125,000 affordable rental units over the next five years. Solutions had to focus on supply-side opportunities to increase housing stock, rather than demand-side strategies like cash assistance for tenants.

Eighteen teams submitted proposals. The only all-undergraduate team took top honors with their plan to redevelop unused public school buildings into “anchor sites” on Chicago’s West and South Sides. The students also suggested levying a vacancy tax on private properties to fund affordable housing, engaging community members in planning, and requiring sites to be within a half mile of public transit.

Elayna Whiteman, Class of 2026, a member of the first-place team, said the goal of the challenge was to spark ideas “that could get other people in the audience thinking—because there were a lot of people in the conference room who either worked for the city or worked on other initiatives for affordable housing.”

Culture and connection

What can Chicago do over the next three years to create a thriving downtown for the next 20 years? Working with alumni mentors, participants in the Harris Policy Innovation Challenge spent nearly five months developing detailed answers to this question.

To improve public spaces, connectivity, and affordability—critical elements of downtown Chicago’s long-term vibrancy—the winning team made three recommendations. First, the students proposed transforming about a half-mile stretch of Michigan Avenue into a pedestrian, bike, and bus-only corridor. Second, they suggested an overhaul of the underutilized pedway system to connect downtown’s “cultural mile” to the central Loop. Third, to promote residential growth, the project prioritized affordable housing and other amenities for arts and cultural workers.

After the competition, the students’ plan garnered local and national media attention. Team members presented their proposal to the Chicago Bar Association and the Harris Alumni Board. “What we created here was an audacious idea that is a very feasible one,” says Uchenna Offorjebe, MPP’25. The students’ research showed how other cities had repurposed valuable real estate to renew their downtowns, he adds, which “should always evolve and improve.”

The winners of the Harris Policy Innovation Challenge. The team’s proposal to revitalize downtown Chicago involved transit upgrades and affordable housing. (Photography by Be King Media)