Universities participating in Zain Africa Challenge (ZAC) must conduct open and transparent testing to be eligible to compete in their National Qualifying Tournament.  The testing must be open to all undergraduate students.  ZAC provides posters and other promotional materials that the universities utilise to sign up students for the testing.

Each university may select up to five dates on which to conduct the testing.

The ZAC Liaison must complete the Test Date Request form.

Zain Africa Challenge writes and delivers the "master" of the tests to the university.  The ZAC Liaison must securely duplicate and store them until the date(s) of testing.  The cost of photocopying may be reimbursed if proper receipts are submitted.

The test period is 45 minutes in duration and must be supervised by a university faculty or staff member.  After the tests are administered, ZAC provides the test answer sheet(s) to the ZAC Liaison.  A university faculty or staff member must score the tests.  The actual tests are returned to ZAC as proof of administration of the tests.

Following the scoring, 12 to 20 of the high-scoring students are selected to practice the game.  ZAC provides a computerised version of the game for this purpose. The Coach should conduct these practice sessions and then select the four members of the university's Zain Africa Challenge Scholars Team.

Student participation is limited to one year at the International Championship Festival and all students must meet eligibility requirements.