ROCK SPRINGS, WY — The Rock Springs Junior High School Destination Imagination Team, Think About It, won first place at the state Destination Imagination tournament. The tournament took place April 4-5th in Sheridan Wyoming. The RSJH team also took home the prestigious DaVinci Award given to students who show exceptional creativity.
After winning honors for creativity, teamwork and problem solving in the state tournament, Think About It has earned the right to travel to Destination Imagination’s Global Finals, the largest creative thinking and problem solving competition in the world, to be held May 21-24, 2014 in Knoxville, TN. Team members include Clayton Wells, Carly Ebert, Zoey Tozzi, Natasha Blust, Ashley Jessen, Aidan Propst, and Liz Chollak.
They will compete with other teams in the Laugh Art Loud Challenge, one of seven, open-ended challenges that require young people to apply science, technology, engineering and math (STEM), in addition to improvisation, theater arts, writing, project management, communication, innovation, teamwork and community service.
Think About It is among more than 8,000 students representing more than 1,250 teams that will advance to Global Finals, which will be held at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville May 21-24. The team needs to raise over $6,000 to cover expenses for travel and lodging while at the tournament.
“It was an unexpected surprise,” said Liz Chollak.
Destination Imagination is an educational program where student teams are immersed in the creative process needed to solve open-ended challenges, and then present their solutions at regional and state tournaments. If they win at those levels, they may receive an invitation to Global Finals.
The Destination Imagination Program allows students K-College to learn and experience the creative process. Quantitative reasoning, problem solving, risk taking, collaboration, presentations and thinking on your feet are some of the important skills learned in the program.
