We are pleased to announce the winners of the 2022 Law for Change Student Competition:
- Port-of-Call Initiative:
A social change project aimed at empowering refugees and asylum seekers in Hong Kong and enhancing the inclusivity and support in higher education institutions. - TransForm:
TransForm aims to address the injustice jointly constituted by language barriers and legal illiteracy faced by Ethnic Minorities by providing basic legal training to frontline staff in NGOs who face difficulties in understanding legal terminology; producing multilingual information packs on legal issues frequently encountered by Ethnic Minorities; and producing multilingual one-stop application guides that provides interactive explanations on important processes, for instance public rental housing and visa applications. - WholeHearted:
An initiative aimed at providing both legal and personal support to the single father community in Hong Kong.
Congratulations to the winners and thank you to all that participated in this year’s competition!
The Law for Change Student Competition is an opportunity for students to incubate their own social change projects with:
- Mentorship with lawyers and/or professionals from other disciplines
- Workshops and one-on-one consultations on project design and implementation
- Networking opportunities with like-minded students
- Partnership opportunities with non-governmental organizations and social enterprises
- HKD10,000 to prototype their project (for the six finalist teams)
- HKD50,000 to implement their project (for the three winning teams)
Through this Student Competition, PILnet hopes to encourage the next generation to use the law for public interest.
Students are encouraged to develop project ideas in the following focus areas:
- Environment and climate change: Solutions that have the potential to advance protection of the environment or fight climate change.
- Health and wellbeing: Health and wellbeing are defined as holistic concepts and projects may also consider mental, spiritual, and social needs.
- Decent living: Solutions to the housing concerns and housing crisis in Hong Kong.
Projects outside the focus areas above will also be considered but these projects should target underserved communities in Hong Kong or bring creative solutions to a social problem.
| Application deadline | 10 July 2022 (Sun) |
| Opening event
Mentorship component begins |
15 July 2022 (Fri) |
| Workshop 1
(Topic: problem analysis and design thinking) |
16 July 2022 (Sat) |
| Meet-and-greet for students | 23 July 2022 (Sat) |
| Workshop 2
(Topic: project design and monitoring and evaluation) |
30 July 2022 (Sat) |
| Submission of preliminary proposals
(on a team basis) |
14 August 2022 (Sun) |
| Pitching to shortlist six finalist teams
Prototyping begins |
27 August 2022 (Sat) |
| Workshop 3
(Topic: budgeting, confidentiality) |
24 September 2022 |
| Mid-term evaluation session | 5 November 2022 |
| Final Pitching Day and Award Ceremony | 14 January 2023 |
| Implementation of the three winning projects | January to September 2023 |
Recent Winners
Homecoming (2020 Winning Team)
Homecoming aims to empower local homeless people in Hong Kong by enhancing homeless people’s knowledge of their rights and providing them with social and legal services. To strengthen homeless people's rights, this proposal puts forward a project with three phases.
Learn more
Employees’ Compensation Personal Injuries Network (2020 Runner-up Team)
Employees’ Compensation Personal Injuries Network (“EC-PIN”) is a student-led pro bono legal project, which strives for easy protection of workers’ rights to injury compensation. This project aims to empower both workers whose right to employees’ compensation is statutorily protected and workers whose rights have not been recognized through (1) developing an ECPI calculator, (2) public promotion through publishing case articles and information packages and (3) policy advocacy work with the help of NGOs and lawyers.
Learn more
Volunteer Rental Mediation Scheme (VRMS) (2020 Runner-up Team)
The Volunteer Rental Mediation Scheme (VRMS) team provides a platform for tenants and landlords to have free mediation over rental issues under the Covid-19 pandemic.
Learn more