Local youths shine bright at Future City competition

SANDPOINT — When you flip a light switch, power doesn’t just “magically” come to you.

Washington Elementary sixth-grader Payton Polhemus said this was something she had not thought about until going through the Future City research and design process, specifically when it came to solar power.

“I learned that there is so much more science and technology behind it than just light hits the solar panel and, boom, you get power,” Payton said.

Nine sixth-graders in two of the school’s Future City groups recently returned from the regional competition in Boise. Each shared what they had learned, as well as the concept of their cities, with the Daily Bee last week. The kids who went to Boise won the school competition in December, which was judged by members of the community.

The creators of Granite City, which won an award at regionals for “Best Industrial/Commercial Layout,” were Bryce Tyburski, Mason Blaser, Ethan Christensen, Shaylee Benda and Zella Lopez. Fiona Macdonald, Elle Meneghini, Abi Miller and Payton built the city of Ecotopia.

This year’s Future City theme was “Powering our Future,” and each team was tasked with creating a power grid that could withstand a natural disaster.

Granite City, for example, was prone to flooding, so the team’s main source of power was hydrofusion. Sixth-grade teachers Jeanne Warwick and Ann Dickinson were impressed with Bryce, who gained a deep understanding of the concept throughout his research on the topic.

“It’s nuclear fusion underwater,” Bryce explained. “It fuses two hydrogen protons together, then the new protons break apart and the electrons are left over for energy, then the neutrons push the protons back together and it goes again and again …”

For their secondary energy source, Shaylee said they used a process to turn algae cells into oil, using water, sunlight, hot temperatures and pressure. The two energy sources are less likely to be damaged by flooding since they are already underwater and concealed from the elements, Bryce said.

Ethan said they also used a concept of water-resistant houses, which also use recyclables to float the homes when it floods. Although the houses were designed to float, they still had to get people out of their homes and to the mountain top, so they designed a steam powered gondola to take people to safety. The gondola, Mason said, pulled water from the lake, evaporating it into steam to move the contraption up the mountain.

The city of Ecotopia was subject to hurricanes, so Payton said they used a wind-powered gauge control center that would power up when the winds hit 65 mph, blocking waves that would rise up in the event of a natural disaster and deflecting the water back into the ocean.

“It doesn’t keep all of the water out — 75.9 percent to be precise — so it makes it an easier cleanup for our city,” Payton said.

The group chose solar and wind power for their energy sources. To protect the power sources from hurricane damage, Elle said, a clear dome was placed over solar plant, which takes some of the sunlight away because it is “pretty thick.”

“So if there is a hurricane, it will hopefully keep the water out so that it is not damaging solar panels, because they are really expensive,” Elle said.

For transportation, Ecotopia uses electric cars and an underground monorail. For the monorail, Abi said, the escalators going down to it are motion activated, and it sends a signal to alert that there is someone ready to be picked up. If it was running all the time, Payton said, it would be a “huge” waste of energy.

While Ecotopia didn’t win any official awards, Warwick said a lot of people, including other teams and judges, stopped by to comment on the “outstanding” artwork of their city.

Dickinson said both teams did a great job, and all the students appreciated the entire experience of being able to go to Boise, from flying on a plane and staying in a hotel, to explaining their projects to the judges and seeing the projects of others. Dickinson said the lessons that the students learned throughout the process were invaluable.

In answer to what was the one thing they took away from the experience, each had a different answer, but all agreed with their classmates’ answers as well. For Payton and Shaylee it was learning about the power sources and the technology behind them. Bryce and Zella said they enjoyed learning about hydrofusion in particular, Mason liked figuring out the concept of the steam powered gondola with his team, and Abi enjoyed learning about transportation and how it could be more efficient. Fiona said she enjoyed seeing all of the other ideas in Boise that kids came up with, particularly for power sources, and Elle said it never occurred to her before how much pollution is in cities.

“So when we went into this challenge it was kind of nice to see what we could do to stop that and why that is happening, so that in the future we can prevent it instead of it getting worse,” Elle said.

Ethan, whose team members quickly agreed with him, said the biggest thing he learned was to never give up.

“When our city started out, we had a completely different idea,” Ethan said. “We learned that it wouldn’t really work, so we had to restart everything and not give up.”

The sixth-graders worked hard on their projects since the first day of school, Warwick said. They researched power sources and went on field trips throughout the fall, including a trip to Albeni Falls Dam, and to Northern Lights, Inc., where they got to see the solar panels and learn how they work. They wrote a 1,500 work essay explaining their cities, then they created virtual models on the computer before building scale models, which were the visuals for their presentations.

The Future City competition, which is supported through multiple grants and fundraisers, Warwick said, is one of the “best ways for students to learn.”

“It’s engaging, it’s whole child, everyone is included, and even though we only had a select group go to Boise … all of the students, no matter their academic level or abilities, they all got to participate in this and they all benefited from it in some way,” Warwick said. “It’s better to see it, touch it, feel it, do it, than to just read about it.”

The kids used the Design for Change framework — feel, imagine, do, share — paired with the engineering design process to come up with solutions for their cities, Dickinson said.

While it is difficult to predict how technology will change as the kids get older, and what type of jobs will be available, Dickinson said, the kids are going to need problem-solving skills and creativity. Those skills, along with presentation and public speaking, are just some of the life-long lessons the students get from the Future City process.

“We are hoping they will change the world,” Warwick said.

Mary Malone can be reached by email at mmalone@bonnercountydailybee.com and follow her on Twitter @MaryDailyBee.