PlimothARWalkingTour Wins Rep. Keating’s (MA-09) 2019 Congressional App Challenge
Rep. William Keating has named four Plymouth students as the winner of the Congressional App Challenge in Massachusetts 9th district. Rising Tide Charter Public School’s Victoria Rice, Leah Maciel, Brynna McNulty and Joshua Krueger submitted PlimothARWalkingTour, an app that encourages people of all ages in the Plymouth area to explore the town
When asked why they were passionate about creating an app that explains privacy policies the student replied,“The 400th anniversary of the landing of the Mayflower in Plymouth takes place in 2020 and there will be celebrations such as festivals and historical conferences that will bring together thousands of people. We want our app to encourage people of all ages, but particularly younger people, to experience the historic sites of our town through our application of AR technology.” 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.