Two Acton-Boxborough Destination Imagination (DI) teams--a high school team and an elementary school team--were chosen to represent Massachusetts at this year’s Global Finals event held at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville from May 23-26. The ABRHS team won 1st place in the “Assembly Required” technical challenge at the secondary level. The Blanchard school team also competed in the “Assembly Required” technical challenge at the elementary level, and was placed 12th.

Each of these teams competed against 50+ teams representing  the best from all over the USA, and several other countries including China, Korea, England, Turkey, Poland and Canada. This year, 1275 teams participated at DI Global Finals, representing 45 states, 7 Canadian provinces and 13 countries, making it the largest event for showcasing creativity and problem solving skills.

The ABRHS team represented Massachusetts at DI Global Finals for the 7th time, and for some of the team members it is the 11th year of participation in this program. This year’s team consisted of Anusha Kothapalli, Brian Li, Deepak Mani, Embert Lin, Nikita Khan, Sheena Thakkar and Tim Cox.

For most in the Blanchard team, this is the 5th year of participation in DI. This year’s team consisted of 6 Blanchard students and a Conant student from Acton: Arthi Nagarajan, Brian Hu, David Lu, James Lottes, Sahana Thakkar, Surya Mani and Yesha Shah.

Both teams were managed by parent volunteers Lakshmi Kaja & D. R. Mani of Boxborough.

Destination Imagination is an educational program that emphasizes teamwork, critical thinking and creativity. Teams are asked to solve a short-term and a long-term problem, with all ideas and solutions coming exclusively from team members--no interference from adults or non-team members is allowed. The short-term Instant Challenge assesses a team’s improvisational problem solving ability. The longer term Central Challenge is selected by the team at the beginning of each DI year, from five different problems published by Destination Imagination, representing different area of focus, ranging from technical and scientific to performing arts and improvisation. Teams typically work on their Central Challenge for several months, before presenting their solution at the Regional Tournament. The best teams advance to the State Tournament. Winning at the State Tournament qualifies a team to represent Massachusetts at Global Finals.

Both of the Acton-Boxborough teams selected the “Assembly Required” technical challenge, with the theme of product assembly and just-in-time order delivery, requiring team-created equipment for transport of team-created parts and products. In addition to technical design, for which the ABHRS team received the highest points, the teams are also scored on their product design,  performance of an original skit and the quality of their sets and props. All materials used are required to fall within a budget of $175, and the set-up, performance, and technical tasks are time-limited to eight minutes.

For more information about the Destination Imagination program, please visit http://www.destinationimagination.org, http://www.globalfinals.org, and  http://www.madikids.org.

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