The third Generation €uro Students’ Award – a competition for secondary school students resident in the euro area – has been launched today as a joint initiative by the European Central Bank (ECB) and 11 national central banks of the euro area (Nationale Bank van België/Banque Nationale de Belgique, Deutsche Bundesbank, Central Bank of Ireland, Banco de España, Banca d’Italia, Banque centrale du Luxembourg, Oesterreichische Nationalbank, Banco de Portugal, Banka Slovenije, Národná banka Slovenska and Suomen Pankki – Finlands Bank). It will cover the academic year 2013-14. The participating national central banks are organising the competition at the national level, while the ECB is organising the competition for international and European schools.
Once again, the competition will have three rounds. The first round, in the form of an online quiz, will run until 15 November 2013. In the second round, the qualifying teams will be invited to submit, in the course of January 2014, an essay on the interest rate decision to be taken by the ECB’s Governing Council in February 2014. The teams will try to predict the Council’s decision, giving their reasoning for their chosen outcome. The best performers from each of the national schools groups and from the international and European schools group will proceed to the third and final round, where they will be asked to give a presentation, this time as they predict the Governing Council’s April 2014 interest rate decision. The competition will end with the European award event, a prize-giving ceremony held at the ECB in Frankfurt am Main.
Since its launch in 2011, the Generation €uro Students’ Award has been a huge success. Students who have taken part have described the competition as highly informative, motivating and beneficial to their studies. Their teachers, who played a key role in guiding the teams through each competition round, also found it a useful and practical exercise that enabled them not only to expand their knowledge of macroeconomics, but also to develop a wide range of technical skills.
Teams are invited to register for the third Generation €uro Students’ Award at www.generationeuro.eu. Further information on the competition, including last year’s results and events, is also available on this website or can be requested by writing to generationeuro@ecb.europa.eu.
