National final
The CEC, a top-level competition, brings the crème de la crème of Canada's engineers of tomorrow together with government, university and industry representatives. To participate, contestants must first win the regional engineering competitions held in the Atlantic provinces, Québec, Ontario and the West. Only first- and second-place winners qualify for the CEC, the national final. Among Québec institutions to be represented are Polytechnique, Université de Sherbrooke, École de technologie supérieure and Université du Québec à Chicoutimi.

The competitions, which are open to the public, take place Saturday, March 11, at the Plaza Hotel Centre-Ville. This is a unique opportunity to see the most promising engineers of the future pit themselves against complex technological problems, build and test prototypes, and debate current issues.

Six brain-burning categories!
The CEC puts contestants' brainpower to the test, and on more than just one level: design, manufacturing, communication, and making engineering accessible, among others. The budding engineers go head-to-head in six categories: Engineering Communication, Innovative Design, Consulting Engineering, Extemporaneous Debate, Team Design, and Senior Team Design. Contestants meet the challenges in two- to four-person teams according to category, with the exception of Engineering Communication and Innovative Design, where contestants can compete solo.

Engineering Communication -- Participants must give a presentation in layman's terms outlining the principles governing a given technology, then formulate a thoughtful and structured argument on its various impacts. Contestants will be judged on their communication skills and ability to connect in layman's terms, along with their overall analysis, position and synthesis.
 
Consulting Engineering-- Judged primarily on communication abilities, four-person teams will have four to six hours in which to develop an innovative solution to a given problem, assess its economic and social aspects, then offer their solution to their "client" (in this case, the jury).
 
Innovative Design-- From their booths, participants propose novel and original solutions to a problem of their choice, supported by a market analysis, feasibility study and marketing or development plan, all in the interests of promoting the idea with the general public.

Extemporaneous Debate -- In teams of two, contestants debate a topic revealed only moments before the discussion begins -- a real feat of improvisation! Team members will take five-minute turns defending or discrediting the arguments until time is up and the head of each team presents the final argument.

Team Design -- First- and second-year undergraduate students have four to six hours in which to design and produce a prototype based on objectives and limitations revealed only on the day of the competition.

Senior Team Design -- Without a doubt, the most demanding of all the categories. Four-person teams consisting of third- and fourth-year undergraduate students have 12 to 16 hours to design and build a prototype. To max the stress, the objectives and constraints are revealed to them only at the very last minute!

A jury composed of industry and university representatives will determine which contestants or teams perform best, before awarding cash prizes of $3,000, $2,000 and $1,000 to the first-, second- and third-place winners in each category. Five special prizes will also be awarded: Environmental Awareness, Technical Excellence, Social Awareness, Communication Excellence and Team Spirit.

• Engineering Communication: Friday from 8 a.m. to noon and from 2 to 5 p.m. (Fortin Room)
• Innovative Design: booths open Friday and Saturday from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. (Riopelle-Gagnon Room)
• Extemporaneous Debate: starting Saturday morning at 8 a.m. (Bellefleur Room) and in the afternoon at 3 p.m. (Van Gogh-Renoir Room)
• Team Design: Saturday from 8 a.m. to noon (Fortin Room)
• Senior Team Design: Saturday from 9:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. (Van Gogh-Renoir Room)

www.cci2006.ca