Chennai Students Shine in HCL Jigsaw’s Search for “India’s Top Young Problem Solvers”

Chennai : The first edition of HCL Jigsaw, India’s premier critical reasoning platform designed to assess important 21^st-century skills in young (Grade 6 to 9) students, today announced the 12 winners of the multi-stage competition. Crowned as ‘India’s Top Young Problem Solvers’, the winners demonstrated exceptional problem-solving and critical-reasoning skills through creative solutions to real-world problems that they were required to solve during the competition. Out of the 12 winners, three students from Chennai – Nithika N (Grade 8) from D.A.V Public School, Velachery, Sai Arun Prasaad (Grade 6) from Budding Minds International School and Yuvankumar S (Grade 6) from Hiranandani Upscale School were declared as India’s Top Young Problem Solvers.

HCL Jigsaw hosted a Pan-India Critical Reasoning Olympiad as the qualifier round (or round 1) earlier this month using an adaptive multiple-choice questions format. The top 30 percentile or around 1000 students qualified for the final stage of the competition which took place on July 31^st and August 1^st. Stage one of the two-day finale saw participants grouped in teams of three, working together on a common problem in a virtual mystery room set-up. Here participants were assessed on their collaborative skills and creativity. The top three teams, consisting of 36 finalists, were shortlisted to compete in the final stage at an individual level. They presented their plans to solve a real-world case scenario to an expert jury that included eminent leaders and academicians subject matter experts from HCL and Shiv Nadar Foundation.

Finalists in each grade were given problems related to specific sectoral themes. These included Future of Shopping (Grade 6), Designing Smart Cities (Grade 7), Creating an Empathetic Healthcare Solution (Grade 8), and Designing an Electric Vehicle (Grade 9). The top three students from each grade (a total of 12 students) were declared the winners of the inaugural edition of HCL Jigsaw.

Congratulating the winners, Mr. Sundar Mahalingam, President Strategy at HCL Corporation, said, “A big shout-out to all winners in what was a keenly fought competition. At HCL, we are focused on helping multiply the potential of individuals and communities at large. HCL Jigsaw is an endeavor to enable this by helping enhance 21^st-century skills in young individuals that allow them to grow into leaders of tomorrow.”

The winners of the first edition of HCL Jigsaw are:

• Grade 9 was assessed on solutions for designing an Electric Vehicle suitable for extreme weather conditions
  • Arav Manoj, The Samhita Academy, Bengaluru
  • Khyati Kulshreshta, AMU Girls’ School, Aligarh
  • Raghav Garg, Shiv Nadar School, Faridabad

• Grade 8 was assessed for designing a Healthcare App for patients, enabling smooth consultation and treatment completion
  • Nithika N, D.A.V Public School, Velachery, Chennai
  • Siddhartha Bose, Julien Day School Ganganagar, Kolkata
  • Vijayalakshmi Rangnathan, Clarence Public School, Bengaluru

• Grade 7 was assessed for creating an integrated technology-led system for a Smart City
  • Adil Jibu, Home school, Bengaluru
  • Ahan Sparsh, Welham Boys’ School, Patna
  • Stasha Shivnani, Vikhe Patil Memorial School, Pune

• Grade 6 was assessed on solutions for designing an Electric Vehicle suitable for extreme weather conditions
  • Aalekh Tandon, Ryan International School, Bannerghatta, Bengaluru
  • Sai Arun Prasaad, Budding Minds International School, Chennai
  • Yuvankumar S, Hiranandani Upscale School, Chennai

The 12 winners of HCL Jigsaw will get an opportunity to experience HCL Engineering and Innovation labs along with cash prizes and gadgets worth Rs. 1 lakh, each.

The participating students at HCL Jigsaw Finale represented over 500 leading schools from across the country, including Delhi Public Schools, Shiv Nadar School, The DAV Public School Velachery, Chennai, and many more. 71% of the qualifying students came from cities including Bengaluru (highest number of students), Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Delhi, Noida, Gurugram, Kolkata, Pune, and Faridabad.