AED Locator Wins Rep. Shalala (FL-27) 2019 Congressional App Challenge
Rep. Donna Shalala has named four Coral Gables student as the winner of the Congressional App Challenge in Florida’s 27th district. Gulliver Preparatory School’s Kamal Kay-Ramos, Joshua Delgado, Jordan Schmidt and Jake Charron submitted AED Locator, an app helping people going into cardiac arrest locate AED and defibrillator as fast as possible.
When asked why they were passionate about creating a medical app the students replied,“We are students who want to make an impact and change the world. As we researched for a problem to tackle, we saw that cardiac arrest is a major one that impacts thousands of lives.” 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.