Students from all Québec universities faced off in the finals of this provincial competition — an adaptation of the worldwide 3-Minute Thesis contest — held May 7 at Palais des congrès de Montréal as part of the ACFAS (Association francophone pour le savoir, or francophone association for knowledge) conference.

The idea of the Votre soutenance en 180 secondes competition is to allow students to present their research topics in simple terms to a diverse audience of laypersons. Each student has three minutes to provide a clear, concise – but nonetheless persuasive – overview of his or her research project, while complying with a set of rules.

During an internal competition held April 18, Viviane and Jérôme Poulin were chosen to represent Polytechnique Montréal at the Votre soutenance en 180 secondes finals.

Our two  representatives were up against finalists from 17 Québec universities, and Viviane Lalande took top honours.

Our heartiest congratulations to Viviane!

The competition winners were interviewed during the La tête au carré! daily culture and science news show on the French network France Inter, which was broadcasting daily from the 80th ACFAS conference.

To find out  more about the competition, click here.