By Edie Grossfield
The high school students took first place in the national BDPA Technology Conference, which was Aug. 15-17 in Washington, D.C., improving on the silver medal that the team won in 2006.
The BDPA Southern Minnesota chapter team beat peers from much larger cities, including Washington DC, and Detroit, and the defending champions from Chicago.
The team members are Yaa Kwansa, a Schaeffer Academy sophomore; Ahmed Mahamad, a Mayo High School junior; Lauren Pemberton, a Lourdes High School senior; Kunle Roberts, a Mayo senior; and Adwait Walimbe, a John Marshall High School freshman. Alternate members are Mohamed Ibrahim, a John Marshall junior; and Katie Lettelleir, a 2007 Century High School graduate.
Each of the winners came away with a trophy, a $3,000 college scholarship, a digital camera, a photo printer and an mp3 music and video player.
The competition included oral and written exams in computer programming, and an eight-hour project.
Hours and hours of study, even during summer vacation, paid off recently for a team of seven young computer programmers.
The high school students took first place in the national BDPA Technology Conference, which was Aug. 15-17 in Washington, D.C., improving on the silver medal that the team won in 2006.
The BDPA Southern Minnesota chapter team beat peers from much larger cities, including Washington DC, and Detroit, and the defending champions from Chicago.
"Our team achieved the highest score on both the written and programming portions of the competition, and of course, the highest overall score, which is what earned us first place," said the team's coach Zachary Garbow, an IBM software engineer.
The team members are Yaa Kwansa, a Schaeffer Academy sophomore; Ahmed Mahamad, a Mayo High School junior; Lauren Pemberton, a Lourdes High School senior; Kunle Roberts, a Mayo senior; and Adwait Walimbe, a John Marshall High School freshman. Alternate members are Mohamed Ibrahim, a John Marshall junior; and Katie Lettelleir, a 2007 Century High School graduate.
Each of the winners came away with a trophy, a $3,000 college scholarship, a digital camera, a photo printer and an mp3 music and video player.
The competition included oral and written exams in computer programming, and an eight-hour project.
3 comments:
Is there no love that can be shared with our 2007 national HSCC champions?
Congratulations to the Southern MN SITES students and HSCC winners! The local chapter held a wonderful celebration on 9/15 to congratulate the super team. The event was an outside spectacular filled with balloons, volley ball, basketball and fun. Zack and the Calverts (Nat & Jongy) were honored by the students at the event held at IBM and catered by the New Orleans Cajun Connection. These young people are a "force" in competition and life.
Betty - Do you know if anyone tooks picktures from your chapter of the event on 9/15/07? I would love to post them on our blog here if that is possible. For that matter, did anyone take pictures of the winning team during their visit to Washington DC last month?
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