Contests and competitions are crucial to encourage the next generation to use its skills to protect the environment, to foster optimism and to highlight some bright minds.

The third annual Portland Cement Association's "Concrete Thinking for a Sustainable World" design competition is the latest to come across my desk, and is calling for all international students to submit sustainable design ideas. The categories include designing an environmentally responsible recycling center and designing a single element of a building that provides a solution to real-world environmental challenges.

The prizes total $50,000, and each winning school gets StructurePoint concrete design software worth almost $10,000. Last year's winner, who demonstrated how materials can be diverted from a landfill to create building materials for green structures, is quite a success story. He won the contest and was offered a job in a design firm upon graduation, and is now working towards gaining his LEED certification.