2026-2027 DI Challenges

Each Destination Imagination Challenge is an exercise that socially and intellectually activates students by prompting them to use creativity and teamwork to solve a complex problem.

Technical Challenge: Get Sorted

The Technical Challenge prompts students to complete tasks by using engineering, research, strategic planning, and related skills.

Design and build a sorting system that gets objects where they’re supposed to be. Then bring it to life through a story about a character who arrives in the wrong place. How will you sort the situation out?

• Design and build a sorting system that can move team-provided items into groups.
• Create and present a story about at least one character who arrives in the wrong place.
  Include an influential character.

• Design and create an arrival effect.
• Integrate the items, the sorting system, and the sorting process into the Presentation.
• Create and present two Team Choice Elements that show off the team’s interests, skills, areas of strength, and talents.

Engineering Challenge: Under Investigation

The Engineering Challenge asks students to explore and apply engineering skills and tools to design and build solutions to specific applications.

Design and build a system that can measure the weight of an object as accurately as possible. Then use it as part of a story about a detailed investigation. What clues will lead you to the answer?

• Create and present a story about a detailed investigation of an unusual occurrence.
• Include a freeze that shows at least one character continuing to interact with elements of a scene while the rest of the action has stopped.
• Design and build a freestanding weight measurement system that will be used to determine the weight of randomly selected mystery weights.
• Integrate the weight measurement system, the mystery weights, and the weight measurement system testing into the Presentation.
• Create and present two Team Choice Elements that show off the team’s interests, skills, areas of strength, and talents.

Scientific Challenge: Lab Legends

Our Scientific Challenge blends the curiosity of scientific research with the creative expression of performance art.

Tell the story of two rivals racing toward the same goal using applied science. Keep the story moving with a live-action montage as the competition unfolds. Who will come out on top?

• Create and present a story about 2 rivals who are each attempting to achieve the same goal.
• Research different types of applied science and integrate your research into the Presentation.
• Design and create 2 different demonstrations of applied science.
• Create and present a live-action montage.
• Create and present two Team Choice Elements that show off the team’s interests, skills, areas of strength, and talents.

Fine Arts Challenge: Act Natural

Our Fine Arts Challenge helps students develop acting and creative skills through artistic media, theater arts, scriptwriting, and prop design.

Create your own fable featuring non-human characters and a meaningful lesson. Use natural materials, interactive scenery, and an animated prop to bring your story to life. What lesson will your story share?

• Present a team-created fable.
• Include an exaggerated character.
• Use natural materials to create and/or enhance at least one physical element of your Presentation.
• Design and create interactive scenery and an animated prop.
• Create and present two Team Choice Elements that show off the team’s interests, skills, areas of strength, and talents.

Improvisational Challenge: Just Duet

Our Improvisational Challenge is all about research, spontaneity, and storytelling. Teams receive topics and quickly produce skits.

Step into the shoes of a famous duo who find themselves in a ridiculous situation. Use a single tool, background music, and your improv skills to tell a two-act story. How will your duo handle the chaos?

• Create an improvisational skit in 2 acts that tells a story about a famous duo.
• Act 1 must show how the members of the famous duo get into a randomly selected ridiculous situation.
• Act 2 must show how the members of the famous duo use a randomly selected tool to attempt to resolve the ridiculous situation.
• Incorporate background music into each act.

Service Learning Challenge: Game Changers

Our Service Learning Challenge is designed to engage students in public service that addresses real-life community issues.

Design and carry out a project that addresses a real community need. Share what you accomplished through a story set in a video game world. What challenge will you take on?

• Identify, design, carry out, and evaluate a project that addresses a need in a real community.
  Create and present a live theatrical Presentation that tells a story about at least one character who is attempting to achieve an objective within a video game world.

• Include a game resource and a desperate situation in the Presentation.
• Integrate information about the Project into the Presentation.
• Design and build a game resource tracker.
• Create and present two Team Choice Elements that show off the team’s interests, skills, areas of strength, and talents.

Early Learning Challenge: Feeling Wild

Our Rising Stars for Early Learners Challenge offers simple experiences with the creative process, and it gives young kids (preschool through 2nd grade) a place to work together and make new friends.

Explore how animals use their senses to understand the world around them. Then create a story about animals who discover a mysterious object. What will they discover when they work together?

• Present a play about animals who find a mysterious object in their environment.
• Show how at least 2 animals use their senses to explore the mysterious object.
• Design and build a set that shows the environment where the animals live.
• Design and create a model of the mysterious object to include in your pl

Instant Challenge

All teams will have the opportunity to solve an Instant Challenge. These challenges require teams to engage in quick, creative and critical thinking.

In a world with growing cultural connections, increased levels and types of communication, and a new need for real-time teamwork and problem-solving, the ability to solve problems quickly is becoming increasingly critical.

• Each team will be asked to solve an Instant Challenge for their DI tournament.
• The team must think on their feet by applying appropriate skills to produce a solution in a short period of time.
• Instant Challenges are performance-based, task-based, or a combination of the two.
• Although each Instant Challenge has different requirements, all Instant Challenges reward teams for their teamwork.
• Instant Challenges are kept confidential until it is time for teams to solve them.

Challenges From Past Seasons