Veritas AI Announces Winners of the 2026 Singularity: AI Essay Contest

Cambridge, MA. June 16, 2026.

Veritas AI, a global AI education program working with high school students across 160+ countries, today announced the winners of its 2026 Singularity: AI Essay Contest. The competition drew over 500 submissions from students in 50 countries, with essays judged in a double-blind review process by researchers from MIT, Yale, and Oxford.

The Singularity contest invites high school students worldwide to engage with questions that will define how humanity thinks, works, and lives alongside artificial intelligence. Essays are evaluated on originality, depth of analysis, quality of evidence, structure, and presentation.

After a rigorous review process, the top 6 medals were awarded to:

Gold Medal

Justin Iocco, Brooklyn Technical High School, United States

Silver Medal

Matthew Pineda, St. Paul University Quezon City, Philippines

Srishti Purohit, Adarsh Public School, India

Bronze Medal

Sheraz Hassan, The City School Ravi Campus, Pakistan

Aarav Kalra, Saratoga High School, United States

Sahir Suri, James Logan High School, United States

You can read the winners’ essays here.

This year's prompts were contributed by researchers from Yale, MIT, and Oxford and covered questions ranging from whether AI can truly understand scientific theories to what remains uniquely human about the creative process in a world where AI can generate art, code, and literature in seconds.

Winners received cash prizes and scholarships toward Veritas AI programs, with the Gold recipient earning a $500 cash prize and a $2,490 program scholarship.

Silver winner Srishti Purohit noted that the competition pushed her beyond instinct toward argument, and that committing to a real position early made the writing process significantly stronger.

"Over 500 essays from 50 countries, all grappling seriously with the hardest questions about AI, is not something you take for granted," said Tyler Moulton, Director of Veritas AI. "These students are not waiting to be handed answers about what AI means for creativity, intelligence, and society. They are working it out themselves, on the page, with rigor. That is exactly what Singularity is for."

About Veritas AI

Veritas AI works with high school students across 160+ countries to build real understanding of artificial intelligence. Through mentorship, research programs, and competitions like Singularity, Veritas AI brings the next generation of thinkers into the most important conversations about AI.

For more information, visit veritasai.com.

Media Contact: Please email contact@veritasai.com