On October 16, 2026, more than 270 students and teacher delegates from 15 public and independent schools across the Greater Toronto Area gathered at Branksome Hall’s iCAST building for the tenth annual Toronto Youth STEM & Innovation Conference (TYSIC). Organized by a student executive team from across the GTA, including Branksome Hall students Alyssa and Esther, TYSIC brought together participants to explore emerging ideas, celebrate innovation and connect with like-minded peers.

This year, the Innovation Challenge featured two streams: the Pre-Event Challenge and the Day-of Challenge. Designed to move STEM beyond listening and into practice, the challenge invited teams of two to four students to develop and pitch innovative solutions to real-world problems.

For the Pre-Event Challenge, participants received their prompt one month before the conference, allowing them to research and develop their proposals in advance. Centred on the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities, the challenge asked students to identify an issue within an urban system and propose an original, feasible intervention to make cities more inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable.

The Day-of Challenge, in partnership with Urban Minds, introduced a more time-sensitive problem-solving experience. Inspired by a real project Urban Minds is delivering in Toronto, the prompt was revealed on the morning of the conference, giving participants just one day to develop their proposals before presenting to a panel of judges. This year’s challenge asked: How might we design an equitable and accessible electric vehicle (EV) charging network for Toronto’s future? Students explored how charging infrastructure could better serve diverse communities, address barriers to EV adoption and improve accessibility for future generations.

Beyond the Innovation Challenge, delegates explored a booth fair featuring Perform for a Smile, INTEGIRLS and more, alongside speaker sessions with leaders across artificial intelligence, medicine, technology, finance and higher education. Speakers included Pavel Abdur-Rahman of Bluevale Capital Group, Dr. Jane Moran, Chief Technology Officer of Indigo Books & Music, and Dr. Rajeev Chib of CIBC, among others. Together, these experiences exposed students to diverse applications of STEM and opportunities to connect classroom learning with real-world innovation.

The conference culminated in the final judging and awards presentation during the closing ceremony, where the winners of both Innovation Challenge streams were announced. Celine Wan and Andreas Scopel were named winners of the Pre-Event Challenge, while Anthony Su, Alex Lin, and Jeremy Ge took home the top honour in the Day-of Challenge. Their achievements highlighted the creativity, collaboration and problem-solving skills demonstrated by students throughout the conference.

The executive team was impressed by the quality of this year’s work and pleased with the growth of the conference.

“Even though the process was long and demanding, and we had to delay the conference twice, it was amazing to see all of our hard work come together!” said Esther, a member of the TYSIC executive team. 

Now in its tenth year, TYSIC continues to make STEM accessible to young minds, creating opportunities to collaborate and approach real-world challenges creatively. Alyssa, TYSIC executive member, reflected: “This year's conference would not have been possible without the incredible sponsors and booths. Finding sponsors with the same vision as us was key to creating a great conference.” TYSIC also owes its success to the executive team and the Branksome Hall staff who helped bring the event to life at iCAST.