If you’ve been hearing buzz about the Presidential AI Challenge and wondering how it applies to you as an educator, this post is for you! I dug into the 19-page official guidebook so you don’t have to, and I’m breaking down what matters most.
This challenge is a chance for educators across the U.S. to showcase how we’re preparing students for an AI-powered future. And yes, the awards are real (hello, prize money!).
Let’s walk through the essentials.
Start Here: The Presidential AI Challenge at a Glance
The challenge has three tracks:
- Tracks 1 and 2: Youth team entries
- Track 3: Educator team entries
This guide covers everything you need to know to enter Track 3 as an educator. (Tracks 1 and 2 follow a separate set of rules and requirements.)
Who Can Enter the Presidential AI Challenge?
The educator category is designed specifically for U.S. K–12 teachers—that includes public, charter, and private school teachers, as well as homeschool educators.
A team can include 1–3 educators, and one of these educators needs to serve as the lead team member. You don’t have to take on the challenge alone! Grab your teacher bestie, team up, and maybe even walk away with cash.
What You Can Win
Even if you don’t win the big prize, all participants receive a Presidential Certificate of Participation.
For those who enter the optional competition:
- State Champions earn achievement certificates, cloud credits, and resources.
- Regional Champions receive everything from the state champion level plus eligibility to be considered for an invitation to an in-person event in Washington D.C.
- National Champions receive everything from the state champion level plus… the cash prize of $10,000 per educator team member.
That means your team of three educators can win $30,000!
What Will You Create?
The Educator Track has two pathways for entries:
- Teach an AI concept to your students in a new, unique way: Maybe you’ve been experimenting with large language models (LLMs) in your literature class, or you’ve found a creative way to explain machine learning to middle schoolers. This track is all about taking AI concepts and making them accessible, engaging, and relevant for K–12 students.
- Create a tool based on AI technologies to manage some aspect of your classroom (teaching, communication, efficiency) that could not be completed without AI-based tools: This could be something that supports learning, improves classroom efficiency, or makes content more engaging. For example: AI-generated visualizations using a tool such as Canva AI that help students visualize complex topics.
Tip: Don’t overthink it. The small, simple strategies you use every day can make the biggest impact. What feels minor or obvious to you might be a major win for this challenge. In fact, the challenge emphasizes ideas that are easy to replicate. Those everyday strategies are often the most realistic and scalable.
Your Submission Checklist
Every team entry must be packaged as a single PDF (maximum 10 pages, 50MB, 12-point font). Here’s what the PDF must include:
- A 500+ word narrative explaining your project. This should cover your process, research, and how AI is used responsibly.
- A link to a single video (no more than 4 minutes) adding additional insights not provided in the written narrative.
- A certification of originality confirming that your project is original, created for the challenge, and credits all tools, sources, or research used. Make sure to be transparent with your AI use!
Don’t stress over the video. A simple screencast video goes a long way. Use my favorite tool, ScreenPal. Share your screen and talk through your entry. ScreenPal uploads your video to the cloud automatically and gives you the link to paste into the PDF document. Done!
Tip: Make sure to remove or conceal any student personally identifiable information (names, pictures, etc.) from your submission.
Avoid These Pitfalls
- Submitting multiple files instead of one PDF
- Submitting more than one video link
- Leaving the video link inaccessible (Tip: check the link in a private browsing window to ensure passwords or logins are not required.)
- Forgetting the originality certification
- Exceeding 10 pages
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Including student personal information such as names or faces in examples
The Presidential AI Challenge Timeline
The submission deadline is January 20, 2026.
That means you have plenty of time to plan, test, and refine ideas before the January deadline.
Other important dates include:
- State Champions announced: March 2026
- Regional Championships: April 2026
- National Finals in Washington, D.C.: June 7–10, 2026
What Makes a Winning Presidential AI Challenge Entry
Judging is based on a 100-point rubric. There are two rubrics, one for each pathway: Teach an AI concept in a new way or create or demo an AI-powered classroom tool.
Overall, both rubrics cover similar items, and here’s what matters most:
- Instructional innovation: How unique and transformative is your approach?
- Student or educator engagement and relevance: Will learners be motivated and able to connect?
- Clarity and accuracy of AI content: Are the AI concepts age-appropriate and accurate?
- Process and planning: Did you show thoughtful design and preparation?
- Use and validation of AI tools: Did you test your AI tool responsibly and explain how it helps?
- Presentation quality: Is your demo polished, clear, and engaging?
- Relevance to national priorities: Does your project align with the vision of preparing students for the AI-powered future?
Resources to Get Started
The LindyHoc blog has several resources to help you generate ideas for the challenge:
- Explore AI Literacy TECH-Tac-Toe for inspiration
- Level up your AI skillset with Generative AI TECH-Tac-Toe
- Explore how you can integrate AI literacy into your curriculum
- Create a classroom podcast using AI audio summaries
- Redesign assessments in the age of AI
Entry Ideas You Could Start Tomorrow
If you’re staring at a blank page, explore these challenge-ready ideas for inspiration and guidance.
Ideas for teaching an AI concept to your students in a new, unique way:
AI Bias Detectives
Overview: Students analyze AI-generated images or text to spot signs of bias.
What students do:
- Compare multiple AI-generated images or text snippets responding to the same prompt
- Identify patterns that reveal bias (culture, age etc.)
- Discuss why the bias may exist (training data, historical patterns, etc.)
- Propose ways to reduce bias
What your submission shows:
- A lesson or mini-unit teaching bias, age-appropriate comparisons, and discussion prompts
- Student artifacts: screenshots, sticky-note reflections, or simple bias-spotting checklists
- Your reflections on responsible use of AI with K–12 learners
- How you ensured outputs were age-appropriate
Prompt Engineering as Persuasive Writing
Overview: Students study how different prompt structures change AI output quality.
What students do:
- Draft an argumentative paragraph
- Use AI to generate alternatives with different kinds of prompts
- Compare outputs for clarity, logic, tone, and persuasiveness
- Revise prompts based on what they learn
What your submission shows:
- Examples of student prompts + output pairs
- Mini-lessons connecting prompt engineering to persuasive techniques (verbs, audience, specificity)
- A short video walking through your lesson structure
- How students validated accuracy
Ideas for creating a tool based on AI technologies to manage some aspect of your classroom
AI Feedback Assistant for Exit Tickets
Problem solved: Giving fast, meaningful feedback daily is challenging with time constraints
Your AI solution: A custom GPT or tool that:
- Sorts exit tickets into mastery levels
- Identifies common misconceptions
- Generates sentence starters or next-day reteach notes
- Creates small-group recommendations
What your submission includes:
- Screenshots of the AI tool processing exit tickets
- Your workflow
- Examples of AI-generated feedback + how you edited it for accuracy
- Data showing time saved or student learning impact
- A screencast video showing how the system works start to finish
AI-Generated Visual Supports for Multilingual Learners
Problem solved: Finding or creating visual supports is time-consuming
Your AI solution: Use a text-to-image generator to create:
- Vocabulary visuals
- Illustrated sentence frames
- Multilingual anchor charts
- Concept diagrams
What your submission includes:
- Screenshots showing how you generated and verified images
- Class activities using the images (word sorts, caption writing, speaking practice)
- Reflections on accuracy checks and responsible AI use
The Feedback Accelerator for Writing Tasks
Problem solved: Giving individualized feedback on essays requires hours
Your AI solution: You build a bank of AI-generated, teacher-curated comments aligned to your rubric. AI helps you:
- Identify patterns in student writing
- Suggest rubric-aligned comments
- Flag incomplete or off-topic sections
- Generate strengths-based feedback
What your submission includes:
- Your curated library of AI-suggested feedback statements
- Before/after samples
- Evidence showing time saved while maintaining or increasing quality
More Ideas
If you need more inspiration, use an LLM (ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity) as your planning partner. Give it a list of problems you face in your classroom and ask for project ideas or ways to refine your entry. Try this prompt:
“I teach [grade/subject] and I want to enter the Presidential AI Challenge. I need to either teach an AI concept in a new way OR create an AI classroom tool. My biggest teaching challenges are [list 3]. Generate 5 specific entry ideas that would take me less than [X] hours to develop and test.”
Then ask follow-up questions like: “How would I document this?” or “What evidence would make this entry strong?”
To go pro level, upload the challenge guidebook to the LLM with your prompt.
For even more ideas, refer to the sample projects provided by the challenge.
Official Resources for the Presidential AI Challenge
This post outlines all the need-to-knows. For more details, reference the challenge resources:
You’ve got everything you need to get started—and your idea might be exactly what this challenge is looking for. Now go make EdTech 💯!
