Design for good
Challenge
Learn how to look at your ideas from different perspectives and make thoughtful choices that help both people and the planet thrive.
Whether you're designing a business, campaign, product, or community initiative, this challenge will help you create a stronger, more ethical project designed for lasting positive impact.
Ready to design for good? Register today to participate.
Challenge Duration: September 28 - December 15
Status: Register by Sept. 25
Submissions Due: December 15, 2026
In collaboration with the Regenerative Economics for Secondary Schools
Join the Design for Good Challenge
Register to participate and learn how to use Doughnut Economics as a design lens.
Whether you're a student, educator, or learning together as a class, registration gives you access to the full Design for Good Challenge, including:
Challenge updates and reminders
Practical Design Drops exploring Doughnut Economics and how to use it as a lens for designing better ideas
Activities to help you understand systems, explore impacts, and rethink your design choices
Tools for considering people, communities, resources, equity, and the environment from the very beginning
A final opportunity to put your own idea through the Doughnut lens and identify ways to strengthen it
A printable Certificate of Completion
Already working on an Earth Prize project? Great! Use this challenge as a new design lens for your idea. You'll explore how your project affects people and the planet and identify opportunities to make it more inclusive, sustainable, and impactful.
Don't have a project yet? No problem. You can choose an existing product, business, campaign, or idea to explore and redesign.
How it works
1. Register
Sign up for the Design for Good Challenge to participate and unlock the full experience. You'll receive challenge updates, reminders, and practical Design Drops exploring Doughnut Economics and how to use it as a design lens for creating better ideas.
2. Explore & Rethink
Explore how your ideas connect to people, communities, the economy, and the planet. You'll use the Doughnut as a design lens to investigate impacts, question assumptions, and identify opportunities to make your project more inclusive, sustainable, and impactful.
Already working on an Earth Prize project? Use this challenge to strengthen your idea. Don't have a project? Choose an existing product, business, campaign, or initiative and explore how you could redesign it for good.
3. Redesign & Share
Put what you've learned into practice and show how your thinking has evolved. Share your Design for Good journey, including what you started with, what you discovered through the Doughnut lens, and how you redesigned your idea.
Participants who complete the challenge can receive a Certificate of Completion and the opportunity to share their work with the wider Earth Foundation community.
Design with the Doughnut
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Step 1: Discover the Doughnut
What does it mean for people and the planet to thrive?
Explore the Doughnut model and learn about the balance between meeting people's needs and staying within Earth's ecological limits.
Activity: Explore real world examples and decide whether they help people, protect the planet, or create challenges for either.
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Step 2: See the Bigger Picture
Nothing exists in isolation.
Explore the idea of the Embedded Economy and discover how economies are connected to society and Earth's ecosystems.
Activity: Choose a product or service and trace its connections to people, resources, business, and nature.
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Step 3: Become an Impact detective
What happens behind the scenes?
Explore how markets and businesses affect people and the environment, and consider how different choices could lead to different outcomes.
Activity: Investigate the impacts of a product, business, or service and identify opportunities to do things differently.
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Step 4: Put your idea through the doughnut
Now apply what you've learned.
Take your own idea, an Earth Prize project, or an existing product, business, campaign, or initiative and explore:
How does it affect people?
Who benefits and who might be left out?
What resources does it require?
What impact could it have on the planet?
Who could help make it better?
What could you change to increase its positive impact?
Redesign your idea for people and planet.
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Step 5: Share your design for good
Show us how your thinking evolved.
Create a short video, presentation, poster, or infographic showing:
Your idea: What are you designing?
The problem: What are you trying to address?
The Doughnut test: What did you discover about its impact?
The redesign: What did you change or rethink?
What's next: What would you explore, test, or change next?
Your final project should show how Doughnut Economics helped you see and strengthen your idea in a new way.
Submit your project by december 15, 2026
Your tasks:
Explore the Doughnut Economics principles.
Think about how your project affects people and the planet.
Rethink your design choices around resources, equity, partnerships, and impact.
Refine your project to create more positive impact.
Share how your thinking and project evolved.
Submit your final project or a short overview of your design process.
Click the button below and complete the submission form to finish the challenge and share your Design for Good project!