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The West Jefferson Hills School District high school and middle school Future Problem Solving teams earned first-place honors at the state-level competition, held April 8-9, 2016 in Camp Hill, PA.

They won in every division to earn a trip to the international competition at Michigan State University in June 2016. The championship teams include twelfth graders Ashley Martier, Aleah Bousquet, Kaitlyn Salmon, and Jake Dobransky; eighth-graders Mirza Ahmad, Liam Woodward, Taylor Gaito, and Sam Richard; and sixth-graders Ian Karel, Billy Marshall, Tony Sparta, and Kaylee Rehak.

Two additional teams representing West Jefferson Hills School District competed in the state bowl and should be recognized and commended for their hard work and dedication as well. The Thomas Jefferson High School ninth-grade team, comprised of Mia Como, Elena Savikas, Julia Micklo, and Lindsey Rojtas, finished in fourth place for the middle division. The Pleasant Hills Middle School sixth-grade team, including Caitlyn Chalovich, Molly Sneddon, Harmony Ziccardi, and Christine Rossi, finished in the top eight.

Future Problems Solving is an international program that imagines what the future might look like if some of today’s trends are left unaddressed. The competition was founded by E. Paul Torrence, once a leading educational researcher, with the intentions of teaching students how to think and not what to think. Each year, Future Problem Solving International picks several global issues for competitors to tackle. The competition rewards creativity, the ability to think of a variety of different ideas; flexibility, the ability to approach problems from different angles; and fluency, the ability to generate many ideas.

The West Jefferson Hills teams have had such success because of their great writing skills, variety of perspectives, logical thinking, hard-work, and teamwork. The level of detail, clarity, and creativity that they produce in a two-hour window is truly awe-inspiring.

Click on gallery for team photos.

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