Seventh grade students at The Westwood School placed second at the Annual Future City® Competition North Texas Regionals, hosted by the National Engineers Week Foundation!
The Westwood School was one of 59 North Texas teams which created a city that answered the prompt: Choose one energy source and design a way to generate electric power for a city that does not deplete natural resources and has limited impact on the environment. Using this guide, students were asked to provide a research essay describing their ideas, a second written work describing the key features of their planned city, a computer designed city model, and a physical model using recycled parts with at least one moving feature and with a maximum budget of $100, and a seven minute presentation of their ideas.
For Future City®, Westwood students designed a 
fictional city in Hawaii called Ahi Moku, “Fire Island”. The energy source that the students researched and selected for Ahi Moku was a Geothermal Acquisition Plant with energy generated through induction. They also planned a secondary energy source, the world’s first wind turbine that is turned by the Jetstream.
Ahi Moku‘s planning and construction was a team effort led by the 7th Grade students, and was presented to judges by Dev Ojha, Kari Pompeo and Austin Upshaw. By placing second, Westwood Middle School students received gift cards and a monetary prize totaling over $1,000 (They will be use the funds for their upcoming trip to Washington, D.C. The Ahi Moku team also received special awards for “Best Film” and “Best Application of Futuristic Concepts”.
