The CDE Trailblazer Honor Grant and Award recognise outstanding undergraduate students who embody pioneering excellence in problem-solving and project execution, empowering them to leave a lasting impact on their field. They must also demonstrate exceptional qualities of creativity, leadership, courage, and resilience, as reflected in their project execution, preferably resulting in distinctive accomplishments or measurable impact.

Students who wish to be considered for the grant and/or award must work on a self-initiated final year project (with up to 5 members in the project group) under CDE4301 Innovation & Design Capstone or CDE4301A Ideas to Start-up that addresses significant gaps or challenges in the industry. The project must not be a continuation of an existing project led by a faculty member at NUS or a project proposed by an external organisation.

The grant and award are made possible by the generous support from NUS alumna Ms Serena Teo who established the CDE Trailblazer Honor Fund.

CDE Trailblazer Honor Grant

The grant provides additional support for project expenses beyond standard material and prototyping costs, which may include but not limited to overseas travel for project presentations or on-site studies and other activities that may enhance the project's scope and impact.

Students who qualify for the grant will be invited to present a pitch to an evaluation panel who will assess the potential impact of their project. The pitch will be conducted in Semester 1 of each academic year, starting from AY2026/2027. Students are expected to address the following in their pitch:

• Problem of interest that their project aims to tackle (and why it is a worthwhile problem to address)
• Proposed solution to the problem (and why it could be an innovative solution)
• Project execution plan (i.e. how the proposed solution would be prototyped, tested, and validated), including the proposed budget for the project
• Potential project outcomes (e.g. technology readiness level, industry adoption or implementation, creation of start-ups, etc.)

CDE Trailblazer Honor Award

The award recognises the accomplishments of students who work on self-initiated projects, regardless whether they are recipients of the grant.

An evaluation panel will select the recipient(s) of this award at the end of Semester 2 of each academic year, starting from AY2026/2027, on the basis of distinctive outcomes or measurable impact in their project. Recipients of the award will be given a cash prize.