Creating apps to tackle big social challenges such as communicating with the hearing impaired and studying the risks of concussions, student teams from Miami’s Dr. Michael M. Krop Senior High and Fort Lauderdale’s Pine Crest (PK – 12) School have earned Best in State honors, $5,000 grants and wireless tablets in the Verizon Innovative App Challenge.
The teams can earn an additional $15,000 -- and support from MIT Media Lab developers to turn their concepts into working wireless apps -- by winning the Best In Nation award or through online Fan Favorite voting.
Voting is open now and ends January 31, 2016 at http://appchallenge.tsaweb.org/vote.
Krop students developed an app concept called LanguaSign, (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-llIJcvHxY) which helps the hearing impaired translate sign language into speech.
Pine Crest students created Force Transmission Data Collector (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YReTCxLdMc) to help in the study of concussions and related brain injuries in football.
The winning concepts were selected from more than 1,200 submissions nationwide.
Approximately 1 million high school freshmen each year declare interest in a STEM-related field, but of these students, over 57% will lose interest in STEM by the time they graduate. Because of this, the Verizon Foundation, in partnership with the Technology Student Association, created the Verizon Innovative App Challenge to spark greater student interest in STEM as early as middle school and to make students aware of tech-related career opportunities.
Voting is open through 01/31/16. Fan Favorite and national winners will be announced 02/02/16.