By Janelle Fisher
A & E Editor
KANSAS CITY, MO. – Students from Algoma High School on the Destination Imagination (DI) team Duck Usta traveled to Kansas City this week to compete in the scientific challenge against teams from all over the world at Global Finals May 20-23.
It’s an opportunity some DI teams wait years for, but team member and Algoma sophomore Emily Reif said this was actually her first year in DI, and a whirlwind of an experience.
“It’s been very exciting and stressful all the same time,” she said. “A lot to take in.”
Reif and her team competed in the scientific challenge, where each team was tasked with creating a tall tale, complete with an exaggerated character and a theatrical embellishment.

“My best friend in the performance becomes more famous than me and I don’t have enough friends, so I get jealous and trap her in a snowglobe,” Reif said. “I make her dolls and toys to keep her company. So I control where she goes, what she does and who she talks with until she figures out that I trapped her there. And then she tries to find a way to escape and ends up having a sing-off with me. So we’re doing this sing-off and on the final note, she breaks the glass and escapes.”
That sing-off and accompanying background percussion earned the team a Renaissance Award — an award bestowed upon teams who have demonstrated outstanding skill and effort in design, engineering, execution or performance.
Also competing at Global Finals from Algoma were team Swing, in the middle-level scientific challenge, and The Candy Vans, in the middle-level fine arts challenge.