Be a hero in your community!

The worldwide community often proves its ability to work together to help those suffering from a major disaster. While this generosity is important, too often those suffering in our neighborhoods get overlooked. Whether it’s an elderly woman needing help carrying her groceries, or a family struggling to pay their bills, someone needs help right in our backyards. Unfortunately, they may not receive any without the benefit of the world stage.

The Odyssey Angels program wants to challenge you to use your unique creative problem-solving abilities to help some aspect of your community that would otherwise be overlooked. In return, one team will be selected to attend World Finals to present how it helped its community.

Who can participate?

Anyone can participate! The only limitation is that one person in the Odyssey Angel group is on an Odyssey of the Mind team. The group can be of any size and made up of any individuals with no age limitations. It can be a family, a class, a team, a group of friends – anyone who wants to help their community. In Odyssey Angels “Outside Assistance” is a good thing!

Who does Odyssey Angels benefit?

The focus of an Odyssey Angel group can be anything within the neighborhood they live in. Groups should look for anything that could use creative problem-solving. This is the chance for students to utilize their strengths and help others. Aside from communities around the world that will benefit, participants that form an Odyssey Angels team will also learn important lessons in teamwork, creative problem-solving, compassion, and more.

How is it a competition?

Each group will register with the program. Odyssey Angel teams will explain their charity project and results. Then CCI will choose one that it considers to be not only creative, but beneficial to the community. Up to five representatives of that group will be invited to World Finals as special guests and be able to present its experiences at the Creativity Festival.

How much does it cost?

There is no charge to become an Odyssey Angel. The only responsibility is to find creative ways to help solve a problem within your local community and attempt to do it.

What are the deadlines to participate?

While your project could start and end any time you wish, in order to be in the running to attend World Finals you must enroll in the program by January 31. You can work on your project whenever you wish, however, you must report on your results by April 1. If you have enrolled in the program before the deadline, you will receive a “Progress Report” form that must be returned by the April 1 in order to be considered to attend World Finals.

How will an Odyssey Angel team be selected to attend World Finals?

After the deadline for submitting the projects, a panel will read through each project summary. They will be looking for projects that:

• Found something to fix within their community that others may not have noticed.
• Devised a creative way to attempt to fix it.
• Used teamwork.
• Helped others!

And much like judging in Odyssey of the Mind, those projects that utilize creative thinking will be given more weight than simply the best final outcome. We hope that teams will continue their projects after the deadline to help those in need.

Check out more information at Odyssey Angels!