Competition Overview

Students are required to develop a Project Charter and Plan, including the project and event day schedule, budget, location, and high-level logistical plans while applying their PMI principles.

Who participates in "theProject"?

Student teams comprised of 3 to 6 students from colleges and universities in the Western Michigan area. Although project management tends to favor business, computer science, and engineering curriculums, students of all academic disciplines are highly encouraged to participate.PMP® (project management professional) certified mentors are assigned to each team. In addition, there are faculty champions from each school, a core team of WMPMI members covering a variety of competition responsibilities, and a panel of PMP-certified judges.

Why do students want to participate?

"theProject" engages college students in project management, develops their leadership skills, and provides them with a showcase to demonstrate their leadership abilities on stage and in person with business and community leaders from West Michigan and surrounding areas.

This competition is an excellent tool to teach real-world skills to students, to incite an interest in project management as a career, and to ignite an understanding of how complex problems can be solved and solutions delivered using tools that have been honed in the fires of real-life practice. Finally, the finalist teams in the competition receive cash prizes. 

What’s the format?

Teams are provided with a real-life scenario and must provide solutions in the form of a project plan. The assigned PMP-certified mentors teach them how to transform their solutions into project plans using the initiating and planning processes documented in A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (a.k.a., the PMBOK). Teams have a number of deliverables with due dates to pass through the different Phase Gates. Teams are judged on their use of proper project management techniques, the quality of their solutions, and their ability to present their project plans.

The event day, usually the second week in April, includes team presentations, executive speakers, and the awards ceremony.   

If you have any questions, please send an email to:

Travis Pursel, VP, Academic Outreach  THEProject@wmpmi.org

2024 THEProject Competition Winners

Michigan Technological University - Team - Anchor Management

See THEProject 2024 Brochure for Event Details

2024 Project Description 

College and Education Guide

WMPMI College and University Outreach Activities

TheProject 2023 Spring Competition 

Scenario

Student teams develop a plan to prevent and protect digital infrastructure from a Ransomware attack.

Overview

Recently Virginia State Legislature's IT branch was hit with a Ransomware attack resulting in data loss and interrupting legislation for weeks. As a result of the increasing trend of Ransomware attacks, the Acme Corporation has put out a contract to your team to develop and implement a Ransomware Prevention Plan and put in place a Ransomware Response Plan. The RPP should include enhancing current IT processes, training of IT resources (like clean desk and phishing training) and any desirable certifications for the infrastructure to achieve minimum risk from Ransomware. The RRP should include training for all employees, war line procedures and a desktop planning scenario plan for each year.

To learn more about TheProject 2023 see the details click here

Congratulations to the 2023 Winning teams

1st Place - Team HACME from MTU

2nd Place - Team WileyWare from MTU

3rd Place - Team Bronco Cyber Consulting from WMU

Honorable mentions

Team Synced from Hillsdale College - Overcoming Diversity Award

Seidman Six from GVSU - Most Improved Award

Bulldogs of Business from Ferris University - Underdog Award

Warm welcome all the students, champions, and mentors to our THEProject 2023 competition taking place at the Pinnacle Center in Hudsonville on Monday, April 10, 2023.

This year in 2023, the competition was represented by students from Ferris State University, Grand Valey State University, Michigan Technological University, Hillsdale College, and Western Michigan University.

1st Place - Team HACME from MTU!

2nd Place - Team WileyWare from MTU!

3rd Place - Team Bronco Cyber Consulting from WMU!

Thank you all for your participation! 

For all the participating teams, volunteers and sponsors, we have a consolidated brochure for you consolidating our successful event for 2023!

  TheProject 2023 brochure

For questions, please contact Matt Mills, VP Academic Outreach vpao@wmpmi.org

To all the students, mentors, school champions,
panelists, judges, and volunteers:

THANK YOU!

The 2021 event was a success because of you!

Check out this year's competion in the booklet below.

This year was the 10th annual competition for the Western Michigan Project Management Institute (WMPMI) collegiate project management competition – THEProject. This year the students tackled a scenario that was straight from the headlines.    Transitioning from brick-and-mortar to remote or hybrid-school environment   Create a project plan that will protect the university under conditions similar to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Project Plan will take into consideration lessons learned from the current situation and identify opportunities for the following models: Funding, Matriculation, Campus Building, IT Infrastructure, and IT Security.

1st Place

2nd Place	3rd Place

Honorable Mentions

Each team was provided the 2020 detailed scenario - Inspiring Young Adults To Be The Project Managers And Project Leaders For The Future. 

Read more about the THEProject 2020, participants, and the competition.

Award Winning Teams of 2020:

THEProject 2019 Finalists

Check out these videos from other years 

Read about where students are now, and how THEProject has benefitted their career paths

• THEProject - Where Are They Now