Deadline to be UMEC Competition Director

The University of Manitoba Engineering Competition (UMEC) is an engineering competition run by UMES. All engineering students currently enrolled at the U of M are invited to participate. 

UMEC serves as the qualifier for the regional competition, known as the Western Engineering Competition (WEC). The winning teams from UMEC will be sponsored by UMES to attend WEC, which is held annually in January. For details or questions on how to apply for any of the competitions listed below, please contact the Vice Stick External.

If you are a director, you may not compete in that category or any other categories on the same date. 

There are eight events:

Junior Design

Exclusive to first and second year students, this event challenges teams of four students with a physical engineering problem. With all necessary materials supplied, teams are given a limited amount of time to design and build a solution to the given problem. After the design phase students must give a brief presentation before testing their solution in front of a panel of judges.

Senior Design

Teams made up of four students are presented with an engineering design problem on the day of the competition. Teams have several hours to implement their solution with the materials provided. Teams must also prepare a short presentation on their approach to solving the design problem, followed by a demonstration of their prototype. Senior design is geared towards upper year students, as the design challenge is more difficult than the Junior Design challenge.

Innovative Design

The most technical competition, innovative design requires teams of one to four students to bring a solution to a problem of their choosing. The problems are typically applicable in the real world, and their solutions must be practical, useful and original. Winners at WEC are selected based on the overall engineering process: market research, feasibility studies and design prototyping. 

Impromptu Debate

Teams of two competitors use analytical techniques to present, in parliamentary debate format with minimal preparation, a reasoned point of view on a topic disclosed immediately preceding the event. The goal is to assess the competitors’ abilities to convey ideas and develop arguments and not to assess the competitor knowledge of formal debating rules. Therefore the rules normally used in debates are relaxed. 

Consulting Engineering

The Consulting Engineering competition challenges teams to design a detailed solution to a large-scale engineering problem. Competitors are presented with a problem that morning, and have up to 8 hours to develop a solution and submit a report and presentation they will deliver the next day. The proposal must be made in a way that promotes the solution to potential customers in the form of judges. 

Communications

This competition challenges competitors in teams of two to describe a complicated technical process or issue in terms that the general public can understand. At WEC, this is done in the form of a 20-minute prepared presentation of a topic of the team’s choosing to a panel of technical and non-technical judges, who select winners based on presentation skills, topic analysis, and conveyance. For UMEC, competitors are asked to prepare a brief presentation (5-7minutes) on a topic of their choosing. This topic must be the topic chosen to present at WEC if competitors qualify.

Re-Engineering

The Re-Engineering competition challenges teams of two competitors to find innovative ways to redesign or repurpose an existing product or process in order to improve its functionality or adapt it for a completely new purpose. Competitors are provided specifications on a piece of infrastructure, technology, or design and are given one day to propose a way to use it in order to solve a completely new problem.

Programming

The programming competition will challenge competitors to design a program to simulate an existing engineering problem and demonstrate a solution. Competitors will be provided specifications on a piece of infrastructure, technology or design and will be given one day to design a program, then present it. A portion of this competition will include the design of GUI.