Destination Imagination (DI) is a program for students all across the world. It ranges from elementary school all the way up to high school. According to destinationimagination.org, the mission of DI is, “a fun hands-on system of learning that fosters students’ creativity, courage and curiosity through open-ended academic challenges in the fields of STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics), fine arts and service learning.” They are a nonprofit that is dedicated to teaching students the skills needed to succeed in school, their careers, and beyond.

Just this past weekend, North Point sent three DI teams, lead by Ms. Amber King, to the Global Finals in Knoxville, Tennessee. “It is a huge accomplishment just to make it to the Global finals level,” Ms. King explained. Junior Kinsey Polk expresses the excitement she had after hearing her team was advancing to Globals, “It was very rewarding and obviously I was super excited.” North Point was the only school in Charles County to send a team, let alone three. While there, the students were able to meet and compete with students from over seventeen different countries. “It was a privilege to attend Globals with teams coming from all around the world. Competing in Globals against foreign teams is pretty tough, especially against China- they win a lot. But, it’s such an amazing experience to interact with these teams from all around the world. Competing against them is something you can take and learn from,” sophomore Samantha Frias explains. Polk said, “It was very intimidating to think about going up against 80 or 90 teams from around the world, especially because places like China and Texas are known to dominate against small states like Maryland.” The teams did very well considering there were at least eighty teams competing in each challenge. These are the following students who participated (in their respective teams and rankings):

Knights of the Kitchen Table– 9th Place & Highest score on their Instant Challenge for their bracket

Micheal Snellings

Cassidy Manning

Shelby Green

Madison Stanley

Charlotte Nottingham

Casey Nottingham

DI Team Without a Cool Acronym– Tied for 20th place

Carsen Essing

Andrew Gausepohll

Sarah Steele

Kinsey Polk

Kelsey Swegle

Reines Maliksi

Tree Musketeers– 26th Place

Samantha Frias

Brooke Young

Michelle Esparza

Christen Watson

Mercede Cooper

Mary Ardita

Congratulations to all the students who participated. It has been a very long year for them and they worked very hard to have gotten where they did. “We actually placed first in the state and this was my team’s first year in this particular challenge, so not only was it shocking that we got first against more experienced teams, but we also worked so hard up until the last minute. It felt so good to be able to be recognized at the state level and get the opportunity to show off in Knoxville,” Polk confessed. It was an amazing experience for them where they definitely had a good time, “I very much enjoyed myself. There were so many activities planned that you can do, and events to attend that it’s hard to be bored. We even went swimming in the University of Tennessee’s pool,” Frias exclaimed.

Polk would like to add to all other DI members, “I think the most important aspects of DI are teamwork and creativity. As long as your team has a good dynamic, you’ll be able to solve the challenges as well. Also the good majority of points come from creativity of your solutions, so it’s important to think outside the box and keep an open mind to others’ ideas when working on a solution. Focusing on those two elements are key to being successful at DI.”