ANSWERS:
Disney's Planet Challenge began in 1994 as the California-based Jiminy Cricket's
Environmentality Challenge and was initially a fifth grade competition. In 2009
the program launched nationwide and was renamed Disney's Planet Challenge. At that
time, the competition also expanded to include grades 4-6. The current structure
of the program, divided between an elementary school competition (grades 3-5) and
a middle school competition (grades 6-8), began in 2010.
Disney's Planet Challenge empowers the nation's youth. As an environmentally focused
competition it promotes conservation, informs children about global and local environmental
issues, gives them a voice on those issues and helps them to create real and positive
change in their communities. As a project-based learning competition, Disney's Planet
Challenge expands the education of its participants. The program adheres to all
state academic standards, while also applying an interdisciplinary approach with
a STEM focus. It stresses collaboration, and utilizes a hands-on methodology that
motivates exploration. This style of learning teaches students valuable decision-making
and research skills and prepares them to become engaged citizens within their communities.
- Any 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, or 8th grade classroom in a public or private school
in the United States can participate. 2nd Grade classes can participate if in combination
with a 3rd grade classroom.. Some areas not included
- Puerto Rico
- U.S. Virgin Islands
- American Samoa
- Guam
- Northern Mariana Islands
- Minor Outlying Islands
- Combination classes can participate — 2/3, 3/4 & 4/5 (3/4/5 combo or 2/3/4/5/
combo if applicable) or 5/6, 6/7 & 7/8 (6/7/8 combo if applicable). 5/6 combo
classes must compete within the Middle School competition track.
- After-school clubs can compete as long as the students are comprised of 3rd, 4th
and 5th graders or 6th, 7th and 8th graders and as long as the club is an integral
part of the regular classroom curriculum.
- Homeschool classrooms can compete under the same grade level stipulations.
- 60 students maximum per each classroom, club or group.
- Multiple teams can be added from
Teacher Tools once you are registered and have completed your profile.
- One teacher and up to two co-teachers maximum per classroom or club team.
Participation has been rapidly expanding since the program's national launch in
2009. Our 2010-2011 competition saw participation from over 1800 classrooms across
the nation and included 335 final portfolio submissions.
The amount of time devoted to a Disney's Planet Challenge project is up to the teacher
and students. Project-based learning can incorporate many of the state teaching
standards, so you could fill your day with educational activities related to the
chosen project and this project could potentially become the focus of your classroom
throughout the school year. The portfolio submission deadline is Wednesday, February
15, 2012, but your project can continue beyond that date.
The amount of time devoted to a Disney’s Planet Challenge project is up to
the teacher and students. Project-based learning can incorporate many of the state
teaching standards, so you could fill your day with educational activities related
to the chosen project and this project could potentially become the focus of your
classroom throughout the school year. The portfolio submission deadline is Wednesday,
February 16, 2010, but your project can continue beyond that date.
Absolutely! All grade-level standards are met include reading, vocabulary, research,
writing, oral speaking, science, social studies and math. Disney’s Planet
Challenge allows teachers to introduce and create material that not only addresses
state standards, but also fully engages the minds, hearts, and hands of students.
The portfolio is the final project that you will submit to Disney Planet Challenge.
Take a moment to review
samples of past winning portfolios
Absolutely! We encourage family and community involvement where possible.
Prizes will be awarded to all students and teachers who submit a project regardless
of ranking. Prizes may vary depending upon the competition track. Click to learn
more about the prizes and awards within your competition.
Elementary School Prizes |
Middle School Prizes
Is this your first time registering for Disney’s Planet Challenge? If so,
Enroll your class here!
If you have registered before, sign in to your account
here. Make sure your profile is up to date. Then, select this program year
in the “Manage Your Registration” section. If you have not yet enrolled a team this
year, click “Register Now.” If you have already registered a class this year, click
the “Add A Team” button in the “Manage Your Project” section.
Enrollment for the 2011-2012 program is now closed. Registration is currently open for the 2012-2013 program; this enrollment deadline has yet to be announced.
Upon completing the registration process, you will receive an email with your user
name and password. If you have registered and have not received a confirmation email,
please contact us - immediately.
Using your user name and password, you will be able to login and verify all of the
information that we have for you on file. This login feature is down during the
website update, but it will return soon.
Disney’s Planet Challenge offers a variety of resources to help with your projects.
These resources include: a Step by Step guide, the DPC Handbook, FAQs, sample portfolios,
resources from the California Academy of Sciences, tutorial videos, downloadable
forms, a Resource Center with links to other useful educational and environmental
websites, and sample lesson plans to meet curriculum guidelines for grades 3-8 for
all 50 states and DC. All of these resources can be found under
Project Resources
Yes. We have a dedicated
Mentorship Opportunities section, which includes a UL Class Mentor program
offering support for your classroom and their DPC project from UL experts, including
engineers, scientists and business managers.
You may also be interested in exploring our various social media presences in our
Community Central, where we encourage
you to connect with your fellow DPC teachers.
Speakers and guides can be found in area universities, museums, and nature centers.
Local experts such as university professors, retired naturalists/scientists, and
naturalists from non-profit organizations and local nature areas are amazing resources.
It is important that your principal agrees to your participation in Disney’s Planet
Challenge. Your Cover Sheet requires that you acknowledge that your principal is
aware of your participation in the program. Disney’s Planet Challenge does not need
to approve your project.
Absolutely not! The sky is the limit with Disney’s Planet Challenge. We encourage
outside of the box thinking and as much creativity and originality as possible.
Check out the sample
portfolios to review past winning projects.
For general brainstorming suggestions to help your class develop their project idea,
please see our Step by Step Guide Page,
in particular, Step 4: Get Started
– Choosing a Topic. You can also download the Step by Step Guide from the
downloads section of our Project Resources
Page.
Always check to see if you are already logged in by looking for your User Name in
the green banner on the top right of the page. If you are logged in, you will also
see the button call-out, “Log Out.”
Although we do encourage you to log out after completing your session on the website,
if you do forget to sign out from your account, you will be automatically logged
out after two hours of inactivity.
We strongly recommend against sharing your login information with anyone. If multiple
users are logged in at once and updating your portfolio and/or information, you
risk saving over each other’s work.
If you are working with co-teachers, however, and will be sharing your login, then
please coordinate accordingly so that multiple users are not logged in simultaneously.
As long as multiple users are not logged in simultaneously and they log out of the
project when they are finished, then multiple users should not be a problem, especially
if utilizing only one computer and under your supervision.
However, to ensure that your account and project information is safe and secure,
we strongly encourage you to always supervise the portfolio creation process and
to only use one computer at a time. We do not recommend that any other users have
your login information, as without supervision this could result in changes in your
profile, reflections, cover sheet, and/or portfolio.
Multiple users should never be logged in simultaneously, as they could overwrite
each other’s work.
Once you have received your login info, login using the green banner at the top
of the page at http://dpcproject.com.
This will take you to the
Teacher Tools page. If this is the first time that you have logged in, you
will not have any teams in the “Manage Your Projects” section.
First click “Edit Profile” under “Manage Your Profile.” You will need to fill out
your profile completely.
Once your profile is complete, select the current program year under Manage Your
Registration. You can now register your first team for that program year.
Under “Manage Your Projects” click the “Register Now” button and enter the required
information for your first team.
Your first team is now registered. You can edit the project, and work on the cover
sheet, teacher reflection, student reflections and portfolio through the “Manage
Your Projects” section.
Login to your account. On the
Teacher Tools page, under “Manage your Projects” click the “Add a Team”
button and enter the required information for your new team.
When you login, you have access to all of your teams. After logging in, you can
select the team on which you wish to work from the “Manage Your Projects” section
of the Teacher Tools
page.
Yes. On the Teacher
Tools page, under “Manage your Registration” select the year you wish to
view from the pulldown menu. Your teams from that program year will now appear in
the “Manage Your Projects” section. Click the “View” button for the appropriate
team/project.
Yes. Login to your account, and access the Teacher Tools page. Under “Manage Your Profile” click the
“Edit Profile” button. When your teacher profile pulls up, you will have the option
to edit your username and/or password, along with the other data associated with
your profile. Once you have entered the appropriate changes, simply click the button
at the bottom to save your changes.
Paper portfolios should be no larger than 11”x17”.
The portfolio should be no longer than 16 pages single-sided pages or 8 pages double-sided.
Anything from pictures, videos, newspaper clippings, letters to government agencies,
things your class made, etc. For videos in a hard copy portfolio, please be sure
to write the teacher’s name and school on the disc. If you are creating a
digital portfolio, all of these items can be uploaded into your portfolio online.
YES! We cannot evaluate your project without the cover page and your project WILL
BE DISQUALIFIED without it. Please be sure to download the your appropriate cover
page (Elementary
School Cover Page |
Middle School Cover Page) to fill it out prior to submitting your portfolio.
If you are submitting a digital portfolio, the cover sheet will be available to
you through the “Manage Your Project” section of the Teacher Tools page.
The teacher reflection should be no longer than 1200 words.
No less than five and no more than ten student reflections should be submitted.
They can be typed or handwritten.
The teacher and adults can assist in providing materials and guidance but the purpose
is for the students to create the submissions.
Hard Copy Portfolios should be mailed to:
Disney’s Planet Challenge
C/O Corporate Citizenship Signature Programs
The Walt Disney Company
500 South Buena Vista Street
Burbank, CA 91521-6445
Digital Portfolios should be submitted via our website.
No, hard copy portfolios are not returned. If you would like to keep a copy for
your records, please make a duplicate, or copy your portfolio, before mailing your
portfolio to Disney’s Planet Challenge.
Yes. After you submit your portfolio, along with all of your project assets (cover
sheet, teacher reflection, student reflections), you will still be able to view
your portfolio and all of your supplementary materials. After submitting, however,
you will not be able to edit any of these materials.
Yes. You can export a PDF of your portfolio to your computer and/or print your portfolio,
both while working on it pre-submission or when viewing it post-submission.
Pre-submission, you will find the print and export features in the top toolbar of
the portfolio builder.
Post-submission these same features can be found in the portfolio viewer when you
click the “View” button beside your team under “Manage Your Projects” on the Teacher Tools page.
You can upload video files with the following extensions: .FLV, .WMV, .MOV, .AVI,
.MPG, .MPEG, and .MP4.
We do not recommend any video files outside of the above formats. Other formats
are likely to result in errors.
Our portfolio builder works best with .FLV files. These files tend to have very
few compatibility issues with our program, if any.
Our portfolio builder application only accepts one video per page. If you drag and
drop a second video, it will replace the first video placed on the page. In addition,
you may only drag and drop one video at a time.
You can use up to one video per page; however, you are only permitted up to 5 minutes
of total video per portfolio. These five minutes of run time can be distributed
in any way that works best for your portfolio – for example, one five-minute video
or five one-minute videos or ten 30 second videos.
Videos must be under 20MB in size.
If your videos are under five minutes, under 20 MB, and in one of the accepted video
formats and you are experiencing trouble uploading your video files, please try
converting the file to the Flash Video Format. This format resolves most compatibility
issues.
Don't have a video converter? You can try downloading a converter program. You can
find free software for operation on a Windows operating system at
http://www.dvdvideosoft.com/. You can also contact the DPC team at 1 (877)
235-1399 or disneyplanetchallenge@gmail.com
and they will happily help you convert your files. We do not have any recommended
Macintosh software at this time. If you have a Macintosh system, please contact
our team at the number or email above and our team will help you with the conversion.
2011 — 2012 Enrollment deadline:Friday, December 23rd, 2011,
11:59PM PST
Portfolio submission deadline: All portfolios must be postmarked
or submitted digitally by no later than Wednesday, February 15th, 2012.
Winner announcement: Winners will be announced in March, 2012.
Grand Prize Celebration: April, 2012
Please email us at disneyplanetchallenge@gmail.com
if we were not able to answer your questions in the FAQ section.
Yes, please call us at 1 (877) 235-1399 where a DPC representative will be able
to assist you.
