Past Competitions

The 2025 Simulation Competition was a virtual event taking place entirely online via Zoom. The simulation used was the Pandemic Simulation, originally developed by UVA's Batten School and refurbished by DMS Academy. The Pandemic Simulation has students in the roles of leaders for several nations with shared borders and a responsibility to share resources, develop vaccines and monitor borders in order to mitigate the simulated outbreak.

The 2024 Simulation Competition was a virtual event taking place entirely online via Zoom. The simulation used was the refugee migration simulation known as Host Nations, originally developed by UVA's Batten School and refurbished by DMS Academy. A simulated nation in crisis has resulted in a major influx of thousands of displaced refugees seeking new homes. Students take on the roles of leaders of several nations bordering the crisis nation from which refugees are fleeing.

NASPAA’s 2023 Student Simulation Competition featured the Wildfire Simulation, also known as the Group Communication and Decision-Making Simulation, which required students to think fast and compose a community-driven wildfire mitigation plan. This simulation was designed by University of Colorado Boulder and built by Forio.

The real-time simulation places students in leadership roles within a time-sensitive, fast-paced environment where they must work together to minimize the impact of a deadly infectious disease.

The simulation, backed by extensive real-world data, placed competing students in leadership roles within a fast-paced environment where they worked together to build sustainable public transit infrastructure in their city.

Nearly 600 students from 147 universities in 27 countries took part in the NASPAA-Batten Student Simulation Competition. The simulation was built using real-world data and challenged students to work together to manage a migrant influx in a fast-paced environment.

Participants in the 2018 competition—the largest-ever student simulation competition in higher education--took on the Pandemic Simulation, in which players are confronted the spread of an infectious disease.

The 2017 NASPAA-Batten Student Simulation Competition was on the topic of Food Security and the world-wide effort to address UN Sustainable Development Goal 2. 

The second annual Student Simulation Competition focused on global warming. Students worked together, used the En-ROADS simulation model, built by Climate Interactive, and negotiated with each other to create a feasible policy package to limit global warming.

NASPAA’s 2015 Inaugural Student Simulation Competition was held February 28, 2015. The competition featured the ReThink Health simulation, which required students to apply the skills they have learned in the classroom and implement systems thinking.