Student OpEd Scholarship

The Alliance for Innovation and Infrastructure (Aii) is excited to announce a fall 2025 scholarship for college students. The contest is open to all enrolled college students nationwide and seeks to engage America’s greatest rising minds to think about and articulate solutions to some of the nation’s most pressing challenges.

Aii presents students with one essay prompt and invites them to reflect deeply and conduct their own research. To enter the contest, students will write a well-reasoned and well-supported opinion column (like an OpEd) citing Aii’s work and submit it to a local, state, or national publication of your choosing. Once you’ve done so, upload a hyperlink to the published article or send in proof of a good-faith effort to get your article placed.

Who is Aii?

The Alliance for Innovation and Infrastructure (Aii) is an independent, national research and educational organization working to advance innovation across industry and public policy. The only nationwide public policy think tank dedicated to infrastructure, Aii explores the intersection of economics, law, and public policy in the areas of climate, damage prevention, eminent domain, energy, infrastructure, innovation, technology, and transportation.

The OpEd Prompt

Closely read the following prompt. Read Aii reference material from Selected Sources at the bottom of this page and incorporate relevant information in your own original OpEd article, citing directly to Aii in your final OpEd. Articles must be written in English only and should not exceed 900 words in length. The audience and tone should be toward the general public, or specific regional audience of a given publication.

To enter the contest, students must:

• Write a well-reasoned and well-supported opinion column (or an OpEd).
• Cite Aii and our research material.
• Submit it to a local, state, or national publication of your choosing.
• Once you’ve done so, upload a hyperlink to the published article or send in proof of a good-faith effort to get your article placed.

The article should address the prompt, but be tailored to the style and type of publication you submit to. You may include to editors when you submit that it is an essay contest, or you can simply pitch as an opinion column or OpEd. Depending on the region, students may have more success if they pick a notable, local, or newsworthy topic (e.g., a local election, current event, or recent incident) to frame their article around. For advice and help pitching or for contest clarifications, you may reach out to Benjamin Dierker at aiinonprofitorg@gmail.com.

Eligibility

This contest is open to all currently enrolled college students across the United States. Students will have until December 5 to write out a well-sourced, original argument on one of two prompts – citing Aii research – and attempt to place it in a newspaper or similar publication.

• Open to all enrolled college students, including graduate students
• One entry per student.
• Contest will run from September 1 to December 5. Entries must be made by 11:59pm ET on Friday, December 5.

Rules

• The article must clearly address the prompt, but not restate it (from the newspaper’s perspective, they are just receiving an opinion submission).
• Qualifying articles must cite Aii work in text or hyperlink as part of a well-researched article.
• Articles must be pitched to a local, state, or national publication. Submissions to Aii must be either the final published article link to a live publication website or an email with proof of submission and word document of article draft.
• Abide by any publication requirements such as submission type (in body of email or as attachment), word count, hyperlinks or written sources, etc.