Middle Schoolers Present Winning Design at Contest

Medford Boys & Girls Clubs Youth Win Award at New England Regional Finals of Future Cities Engineering Competition

Middle School youth from the Medford Boys & Girls Club participated in the New England Regional Finals of the Future City Engineering Competition on Saturday, January 21 at Northeastern University. At the New England Regional Finals, the Medford youth won the “Design Challenge” award for the best solution to a design challenge presented to them at the competition. There were 17 middle school teams at the Regional Finals, and the Medford Boys & Girls Club was given the award for the best solution in response to the question of how to respond as a coastal city when the water level is rising and what engineers would be needed to reach the solution.

The three Medford residents who presented at the competition were Claudeigh Decoline, 13, Nicholas Romano, 12, and Joseph Lotto, 11.

To qualify for the New England Regional Finals, the youth spent months preparing for the competition at Medford Boys and Girls Club. They first created a virtual future city using SimCity software. They then researched an alternative energy source and wrote an essay about the alternative energy source they chose for use in their city. The youth built a scale-model of a section of their city, and then prepared a presentation about their city for the competition. The members were assisted and guided by Boys & Girls Club staff member Kim Holt and an engineer-mentor provided by the Future City program, Nadia Bosan.

The youth are already beginning to plan for their participation it the 2013 Regional Finals of the Future City Engineering Competition.

– Submitted by Jacqueline Rudis, Medford Boys and Girls Club Director