Math+ Wins Rep. Brooks (AL-05) 2019 Congressional App Challenge

Rep. Mo Brooks has named a Decatur student as the winner of the Congressional App Challenge in Alabama’s 5th district. Austin High School’s Wesley Lowman submitted Math+, an app that allows users to enhance their math skills.

When asked why they are passionate about creating a math app the student replied,“When I was younger, I noticed that many of my classmates didn’t share my enthusiasm for learning math. This was due to the nature of our curriculum, which required rote memorization. When making this app, I made sure to take into account the things that made math fun for me as a child, and then tried to virtually recreate that experience.” They hope to encourage other students to better their communities by using their computer science skills.  

Over 10,000 students registered for the 2019 Congressional App Challenge. These students created and submitted 2,177 functioning apps, marking the end of the most successful Congressional App Challenge to date. All told, 304 Members of Congress hosted Congressional App Challenges in their districts across 48 states, Puerto Rico, the Mariana Islands, and Washington, D.C.

The CAC is an initiative of the U.S. House of Representatives, where Members of Congress host contests in their districts for middle school and high school students, encouraging them to learn to code and inspiring them to pursue careers in computer science. The non-profit Internet Education Foundation provides the CAC with supplemental staffing and support. In the five years of the Congressional App Challenge, the program has yielded 1134 App Challenges across 48 states. Thousands of functional apps have been created by over 25,000 students, and participant demographics surpass all industry diversity metrics.