The Templeton Middle School sixth grade Future Problem Solving (FPS) team continued the school’s winning ways and qualified for state competition. Paula Myatt, Julie Posh and Michael Yu qualified for state competition by successfully completing the State Bowl Competition Qualifying Packet. The team is coached by Templeton teacher Sherry Malmon.
The three students along with Zachary Dowlding will be among the 250 students and 60 teams in grades 4-12 competing April 21-23 at the FPS State Bowl in Oconomowoc. Teams qualified for state through their work on three practice topics earlier in the year which were “Entertainment,” “Terrorism and Security” and “Agriculture of the 21st Century.”
The topic for the State Bowl is “Depletion of Ocean Species.” Students will brainstorm 16 challenges relating to the new topic, select a significant underlying problem and brainstorm 16 solutions. They will develop five criteria for selecting the best solution and complete the process by writing an action plan for implementing their idea. The written packet is completed in two hours by teams and individual contestants. Students then develop and perform a 4-minute skit to introduce their action plan to an audience of other students, parents and judges.
The aim of FPS is to encourage students to:
- become more creative in their thinking;
- develop richer images of the future;
- strengthen researching skills;
- learn collaborative teamwork skills; and
- increase written and verbal communication skills.
FPS involves more than 200,000 students in 47 states, two Canadian provinces and three foreign countries. In Wisconsin, 140 teams from 40 school districts participated during the school year.