CanadaNews’ Reporter Notes

The National Engineers Week Committee is holding it’s annual Future City Competition for national finalists. Future City is in it’s 16th year of competition and is being held at the Hyatt Regency Capitol Hill; just mere blocks away from the Capitol Building.  The event itself puts a great focus on science, math, and engineering. This event brings together seventh and eighth graders from across the United States to compete in building a futuristic urban design, first on computer and then in large tabletop models.

 These students have spent the past several months trying to build the perfect design for the futuristic cities of tomorrow.   Originally there were 30,000 students in over 1,111 schools that began this journey in early last year.  Presently, there are 37 participating regions at the National Finals.  “It’s a record breaking  year for  Future City.   It’s a good position to be in,” said one of the conference staff members. The finalists are -

Alabama, Arizona, Northern California, Southern California, Colorado, Florida, Florida-Tampa Bay, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas-Great Plains, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, Nevada-Las Vegas, Northern Nevada, New England, New Jersey, New York-Albany Capital District, New York-Buffalo, New York City, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania-Central, Pennsylvania-Philadelphia, Pennsylvania-Pittsburgh, South Carolina, Texas-Houston, North Texas, Washington, D.C., Washington State, and Wisconsin.

 “Engineers will invent robots to help us.  There will be less pollution, more alternative fuels, the air won’t be as polluted and there won’t be so much global warming,” the event’s press release noted.

  For adults, Future City has a teacher and volunteer engineer mentor that works for each group of students.  The students create their cities using the SimCity 3000^TM videogame donated to all participating schools by Electronic Arts, Inc..  From that design, they build large table-top models using recycled materials with a budget of less than $100.  Almost all of the products used are biodegradable and/or recyclable. 

These creative kids write a city abstract and an essay on using engineering to solve an important social need – this year’s theme asks students to describe how nanotechnology will monitor their city’s structures and systems to keep its infrastructure healthy. 

In January, regional competition winning teams were awarded an all-expenses-paid trip to Washington for the Future City National Finals.  This competition is hosted by Bentley Systems, Incorporated, a leading provider of infrastructure design and engineering software. 

Donald Lehr, the media relations consultant for the conference, provided me with this remarks given by Bently Systems:        

          “Part of our responsibility as industry leaders lies in developing the talented and diverse workforce who will be designing the world’s infrastructure in the future,” says Bentley Systems CEO Greg Bentley.  “We’ve joined with many others who support the National Engineers Week Future City Competition because of its unique ability for inspiring students to consider career choices that might otherwise have overlooked engineering.  The combination of engineer mentors, hands-on learning, and teamwork engages students and opens the door to endless possibilities for them and the engineering profession.” 

The winning group during the National Finals will receive a week at US Space Camp in Huntsville, Alabama. 

Future City is sponsored in part by the National Engineers Week Foundation, a formal coalition of more than 75 engineering, professional, and technical societies and some 50 corporations and government agencies.  Founded in 1951 by the National Society of Professional Engineers, the coalition is dedicated to sustaining and growing a dynamic engineering profession by ensuring a diverse and well-educated future engineering workforce, increasing understanding of and interest in engineering and technology careers among young students, and promoting pre-college literacy in math and science.  Among the oldest of America’s professional outreach efforts, Engineers Week also raises public understanding and appreciation of engineering contributions to society through year-round innovative programming and celebration.  Co-chairs for Engineers Week 2008, February 17-23, are the Chinese Institute of Engineers-USA (CIE-USA) and IBM. 

For more information visit www.eweek.org.