Questions, answered.

Enrollment opens October 1, 2026. You can create an account before then, but registration, payment, and the curriculum open on that date.

Registration is $111 per student, priced the same whether you register individually or as part of a team. A team of 4 students pays $111 each, and every student gets their own account, curriculum access, and certification regardless of team size.

Payment is handled manually: at registration you'll see the organization's PayPal, Venmo, and Zelle details, pay your individual share, then submit a short payment confirmation form. An admin verifies each student's payment individually.

No. Payment and enrollment are tracked per student, so your access to your own dashboard, curriculum, and certification track always stays independent of your teammates' payment status.

Either. You can register as an individual or form a team of up to 4 students, whichever suits your project best: a team of 2 is just as valid as a team of 4.

The project itself can be shared across a team, while the learning always stays individual. Each student completes their own curriculum, stage submissions, and Innovation Journal, and earns their own Innovator Profile, badges, and certificate.

Yes. There's no assigned prompt. Students pick a real problem they've noticed and use the I³ pathway to investigate and address it.

The v1 curriculum is six stages, done in order: Insight (is this a real problem?), Investigate (why is it happening, and what does the evidence say?), Imagine (what could solve it, and what must we test first?), Iterate (can we build and test the critical assumption?), Impact (did it make a measurable difference?), and Influence (can we defend it, sustain it, and convince someone to take the next step?). You apply every stage directly to your own project.

One artifact per stage: a Validated Problem Statement + Evidence Notes (Insight), a Research Brief (Investigate), a Concept Portfolio (Imagine), a Tested Prototype + Test Plan + Iteration Log (Iterate), an Impact Report (Impact), and a Final Pitch + Innovation Portfolio (Influence). Worksheets are working tools; the artifact is the polished evidence package.

Each submission is checked against a rubric with six dimensions: Evidence Quality, Reasoning & Interpretation, Process Rigor, Integrity & Reflection, Completeness, and Communication & Clarity. It is a gate, not a grade: you advance when every required dimension meets the standard. Otherwise you get specific feedback, revise, and resubmit. Needing a revision carries no penalty.

No. Reviewers judge the quality of your evidence and thinking, not how impressive the final product looks. An unsuccessful solution can still be excellent innovation work if the learning is rigorous and your conclusions match your evidence.

No. Everyone follows the same six-stage pathway. Depth increases with grade level: some topics are marked for high school, and some are optional stretch topics for strong or older students.

You may, but every stage submission includes a required AI-use disclosure, whether or not you used AI. Imagine also asks you to consider honestly whether your problem needs AI at all.

No. Stages unlock in order, and this is enforced by the platform itself, not just the interface: you can't reach a later stage by guessing its URL before finishing the one before it.

The Investigate stage includes a short safety screening. Certain answers automatically route a project to admin review before it can continue. This protects students and keeps risky work from proceeding unsupervised, not to slow anyone down unnecessarily.

Every project is confidential. It's never made public, and never appears in any public gallery, marketing material, or public-facing judge view.

No. Registering opens the curriculum for the season. Qualifying for the Finals is a separate, later achievement based on completing the required work by one of the qualification windows.

The National Finals are scheduled for August 15, 2027. Only students and teams that have advanced through all six stages enter Finals selection, where their work is compared to choose among strong teams. The detailed Finals judging framework is still being finalized and will be shared with qualifying students ahead of the event.

There are two windows each season: one closing April 30, 2027 and one closing July 30, 2027. Completing the required work by either window keeps a student eligible to advance.

You remain enrolled and keep full access to the curriculum, your Innovator Profile, and your certification track. You just don't advance to the Finals that season.