Project Funding

Fundraising for Your Team

As the CRE[AT]E Challenge is primarily a single-user product design activity, we do not expect most projects to cost more than more than low hundreds of dollars at most. Many successful projects in the past have cost less than $50. Cost should be a consideration when you are working on the scope of your project.

With that said, you may be in a situation where you have identified a real co-designer need that your team is well-suited to tackle, where cost is a limitation that you specifically wish to overcome. Alternatively, you may wish to do fundraising for team travel to the CRE[AT]E Final Event (which is hybrid, so you can participate remotely as well).

If that is the case, we recommend taking a look at the FIRST Robotics Fundraising Toolkit and adapting appropriate parts of that process to raising funds. Note that fielding a FIRST Robotics Team typically costs $15,000 to $20,000, so significantly more than the cost of CRE[AT]E. Some of the more formal elements of the FIRST Fundraising Toolkit that are necessary for requests of that size may not be as necessary for our context.

Requesting Funding from Beaver Works

Beaver Works aims to make the CRE[AT]E Challenge accessible to students regardless of financial status. As such, the program is completely free, and in the past, we have offered grants of approximately $125 to teams that have requested it after we have reviewed your Bill of Materials (and often refined it with your team) in the Orange Gate Design Review.

What stays the same in the 2026-2027 season:

• Grants will still be approximately $125

• Grants can only be provided to non-college US-based teams

• Grants will be provided in the form of Visa gift cards sent to the team coach

What changes compared to previous seasons:

• Grant decisions will be based primarily on team financial status, as reported during registration

• To request a grant, one member of your team must email Challenge staff at bwsi-create-challenge@mit.edu with the subject line "Team ### Grant Request" and include a one-paragraph description of your project along with a preliminary bill of materials at the time that you submit your Orange Gate design review.

  • Replace ### with your team number

  • We will not necessarily hold you to your bill of materials, it is just for us to know roughly what you need to buy

  • You must cc all members of your team, including team coach/captain (if it is not the coach/captain making the request)

• We will attempt to give all teams requesting funding a response within one week of receiving your request. We may follow up with you about your bill of materials, but that will be separate from the grant process.

• Teams without an Orange Gate submission at the time of the request will not be considered. This ensures that we will be focusing on teams that have submitted tangible work.

• Teams submitting a request after the Orange Gate deadline will not be considered. This consolidates the grant review process into a narrower window, making it easier for us to process.

How does Beaver Works get funding?

Beaver Works is part of MIT but does not receive funding from the university. We are entirely self-funded through donors. If you would like to support Beaver Works and the CRE[AT]E Challenge, please see our MIT Giving Page!