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USC advances to Future City Competition

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A team of Fort Couch Middle School students placed first in the 2019 Pittsburgh Regional Future City Competition – punching their ticket to compete at the national Future City Competition Feb. 16-20, in Washington, D.C. This year marked Fort Couch’s 19th year in the competition and the first time taking home the gold. The regional event was held on Jan. 19, at Carnegie Science Center. The Fort Couch team’s presentation was led by eighth-graders Carter Chui and Ella Elkoni and seventh-grader Reese Copenhaver. In addition to first place overall, the Fort Couch team earned three special awards including Best Essay, sponsored by the Carnegie Science Center; Protecting the Public’s Safety and Welfare Through Competent and Ethical Engineering Practices, sponsored by the American Society of Civil Engineers; and 19-Year Anniversary School, presented by the Carnegie Science Center and Engineers’ Society of Western Pennsylvania and the Carnegie Science Center. A team of more than 35 Fort Couch gifted students worked throughout the fall to transform the current city of New Orleans into Parcequetrina (French for “because of Katrina”), existing 100 years in the future. The students designed all aspects of Parcequetrina, from education, to government, transportation, health care, safety and waste management, while assuring that the city would survive a hurricane and, in particular, not lose power. The city combines two kinds of wave energy converters, clear solar panel windows and piezo electric film to create a network of micro-grids that are connected by redundant HVDC lines. For the next few weeks, the Fort Couch Middle School will prepare to take Parcequetrina to the national competition, where the first place teams from each of the 60 regions compete for the Future City Competition’s top prize. Pictured from left are: Alex Todd, Carter Chui, Priyasha Itani, Reese Copenhaver, Ella Elkoni and Libby Eannarino.

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