From left Will Isenhour, Danny Helms, Jonathan Mead and Nic Colley from the University of North Carolina-Central Piedmont Community College, winners of the game design category; Anthony Salcito, Microsoft vice president of Worldwide Public Sector-Education; Mark Hindsbro of Microsoft; Helena Xu, Kavon Gaffari, Wilson To, and Audrey Lee of Team Mobilife, winner of the software design category.
A team from the University of California, Davis, recently took the U.S. grand prize for software design in Microsoft’s Imagine Cup technology competition and is in the international showdown in Poland.
Team Mobilife beat more than 22,000 U.S. students in the eighth annual competition, designed to inspire young people to innovate technologies to solve the world’s toughest environmental, health, technological, social and other problems.
Mobilife’s project helps field doctors use mobile technology for early detection of some vascular diseases among children in developing regions. Although these disorders are normally easy to diagnose in modern hospitals, the lack of tools readily available to doctors who work in places like sub-Saharan Africa, Southern Asia and Oceania make new solutions necessary.
Standing with his team on the podium after the award ceremony at the Newseum in Washington, D.C., Mobilife team member Wilson To struggled to find the right words to convey his feelings.
“They called out our name, and I just started crying,” To said. “I first got involved with the Imagine Cup not because of the chance to go to Poland, or because of the prize money, but because I just wanted to help people.”
The team is in Warsaw, Poland, this month to represent the United States in the worldwide finals and showcase their innovation alongside hundreds of other student teams from around the world.
In addition to cash and prizes awarded to the top teams in the competition, students gain real-life experience, make new friends and attend several training sessions to help them turn their ideas into reality.
The Software Design invitational is Imagine Cup’s largest competition. The winner of the U.S. competition is the only team that will receive an automatic bid to compete at the worldwide finals.
“Imagine Cup is more than a software competition; it’s about inspiring students to become tomorrow’s technology and business leaders,” says Craig Mundie, chief research and strategy officer at Microsoft. “The technology industry not only is a key driver of economic growth and job creation, but also offers vast potential to solve some of the world’s toughest societal problems. The creativity and passion of these students speaks volumes about the impact they will have on the world.”
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Other 2010 U.S. Imagine Cup Winners
Software Design
Students create real-world software and services applications that use Microsoft tools and technology.
First Prize: MangoBunnies, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, DePauw University
Malisa Vongskul and Ashley Myers
A mobile and Web message alert system to inform users of unsafe areas for women.
Second Prize: Extraplaid, Utah State University
Josh Light, Susanna Beck, Yiding Han and Cal Coopmans
A social-networking application called Aidventure to connect entrepreneurs with investors in the micro-banking industry.
Third Prize: Team Blob, South Dakota School of Mines and Technology
Jaelle Scheuerman, Lori Rebenitsch and Robyn Krage
A multitouch design tool to help teachers create interactive presentations.
Game Design
Students create their own video game while helping change the global community.
Grand Prize: University of North Carolina, Central Piedmont Community College
Will Isenhour, Nic Colley, Jonathan Mead and Danny Helms
An educational video game called Sixth that involves a series of quest challenges related to ending poverty around the world.
First Prize: Coffee Powered Altruism, Yale University
Henry Corrigan Gibbs and Christopher Riederer
A strategy game called Alterra that tasks participants with tackling development issues of a country or region.
Second Prize: Ifrit Salsa, University of Houston
Alaa Gharandoq, Jesus Hernandez, Daniel Biediger and Arifur Sabeth
A video game called RoboRecycler that promotes a cleaner environment by collecting, sorting and recycling different items.
Third Prize: LeveL13, University of Houston
Paul Diaz, Reggie Tye, Syung You and Yu Chao Chen
A videogame called Antitoxin Squad that lets participants combat pollution through cultivating plants around the world.
Achievement Awards
Students are recognized for their excellence and creativity. The four awards highlight teams that had public appeal through an open voting process, the best solution accessed through a mobile phone, the top project that utilizes cloud computing, and a Web design competition.
People’s Choice Award: Coders Inc., Illinois Institute of Technology, Georgia Institute of Technology
Krishna Rao Vijayanagar, Yamini Girey and Shayok Mukhopadhyay
An online forum where nongovernmental organizations, volunteers, donors and vendors can interact and share resources.
Windows Azure Award: MedRx, University of Arkansas at Little Rock
Jenish Pahari, Mohammed Akheel Ahmed, Mujeeb M Abdul and Travis Bennett
A platform to make medical data available to researchers around the world.
Mobile Award: LifeCode, Wayne State University
Melissa Hui, Steve Markovitch, Fahima Bhuyan and Kun Wang
A tele-health data capture and analysis platform.
Microsoft bliink Web Design Award: Technology Center of DuPage, Glenbard East High School
Andrey Danilkovich and German Fomin
Editor’s note: This article appears in the July 2010 print edition.
