To the GEC Coordinators
 
Congratulations to the following countries who have registered for the 2008 challenge.

• Australia
• England
• Germany
• Indonesia
  
• Japan
• Korea
• New Zealand
• Norway
  
• Philippines
• Poland
• Scotland
• Singapore
• United States of America
  
• Wales

The 2008 challenge will contain the elements and established format of all previous challenges but will have some changes to detail to meet the needs of global competitors.

• Timeframe – the overall challenge will run to a timetable set on British Summer Time (BST) but competitors from the Asia-Pacific Region and Americas will be offered a staggered start allowing them to start at 11.00am in their region, but still only allowing them 24 hours to complete their national competition and then requiring them to submit their winning teams entry to be judged by the international judging panel who will be working to a BST timetable. The winners will be announced globally in the same BST timeframe as in previous years.

• Judging – Australia the host country will source a number of distinguished judges both locally and internationally. All competing countries are invited to nominate up to two distinguished judges from their country to join the international judging panel. This will give added depth to the judging panel and added international participation. Countries not nominating an international judge will not be disadvantaged in any way because such judges will only be asked to judge submissions from other countries, not their own. A further restriction will be that international judges must not be involved with judging the national competition in their country.
  

• Scoring – for the first time, the results of the international judging panel will be published, giving the rank and score for each entry, these scores plus the judge’s comments will give comprehensive feedback to each national team.
  

• Teams – teams may contain up to 10 students aged 16-19 and be supported by up to two adult mentors/facilitators who are there for support, but not to participate or influence the team’s efforts.

Best regards
Norman Owens OAM
Chairman
Australian Business Week Ltd
Host GEC 2008