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From 2011.igem.org

Following years of discussion, we are going to reorganize iGEM in 2011.

• First, all iGEM teams will participate in Regional Jamborees in their region. The winning teams will advance to the World Championship Jamboree at MIT. This will start with 3 regions:
  • Asia
  • Americas
  • Europe

• Second we will establish a Regional Council and a Judging Committee in each region. Representatives from those committees, and others, will form the Council of Regions and the worldwide Judging Committee.

• Third, we will still be one iGEM program.

We are excited by this change. It should control the costs of attending the iGEM Jamborees and open new opportunities for participation in the running of iGEM.

It is critical that we still have one iGEM program even though we are making the operation of the program more distributed. The requirement to participate in iGEM will remain consistent across all of the regions. The teams will register with iGEM Headquarters, not the regions. The evaluation criterion for awards in the regions will be the same across the regions and at the World Championship Jamboree. Naturally, the regional judging committees will bring new perspectives and will see regional needs that are not now apparent. They will have a voice in the judging criterion through participation with the world judging committee.

These changes have become necessary as the number of teams in iGEM has continued to increase. We do not wish to limit the number of teams or dramatically increase the costs of the Jamboree. Please see Regions/Growth for a projection of iGEM growth over the next five years.