#HTE

How to Explain Something Complicated, in Under Three Minutes, So That Everyone Can Understand It

What’s the hardest part about design? I suppose it depends on your personality, but for me it was never the CAD problem-solving, which I actually enjoyed, but the pitching and presenting part. In order to swiftly convey a complicated idea to a client, you really need to be a masterful storyteller armed with concise visual aids and well-researched statistics.

I thought of this as I watched the following video, which was the winner of the 2017 Breakthrough Junior Challenge. That’s a competition where students have to explain something scientific and complicated in under three minutes, in such a way that everyone can understand it.

This year’s prize was awarded to twelfth-grader Hillary Diane Andales from Tacloban City, Phillippines. She explained the following concept in such a way that even I, a science dummy, was able to grasp it:

As with any good pitch or presentation, the short length belies the many hours that went into it. In this interview Andales reveals it took her 20 drafts of the script and over 200 hours of shooting to produce the sub-3-minute video.

The reward was worth it: For her troubles Andales won a $250,000 scholarship, a $100,000 science lab for her school and $50,000 for the teacher that inspired her. Congratulations to Ms. Andales!