Creativity converges for Wisconsin DI state tournament

BY JANELLE FISHER

CONTRIBUTING EDITOR

GREEN BAY – Hundreds of students from across the state, including four teams from the Algoma School District, traveled to UW-Green Bay last Saturday, April 6, to compete in the Wisconsin Destination Imagination (DI) state tournament for a chance to advance to the Globals Finals tournament happening at the end of May.

To qualify for the affiliate tournament, teams competed at four sectional tournaments in one of six challenges — technical, scientific, fine arts, improvisation, engineering and service learning.

The technical challenge asked students to design and create a pinball system to be integrated into an action/adventure story.

Students in the scientific challenge dug into the world of archeology, discovering artifacts and characters from the past. In the fine arts challenge, teams were tasked with bringing a piece of artwork to life.

Improvisational teams created two-act shows complete with costumes and stock characters on the spot.

The engineering challenge had teams creating modular devices to launch bean bags and be incorporated into stories where everything goes according to plan until a catalyst occurs.

Teams competing in the service learning challenge presented fantasy stories with details intertwined with details from community service projects carried out earlier in the season.

Part of the fun of coming to the state tournament, Affiliate Tournament Director Mikaela Becker said, is the opportunity for teams to see how other students took on the same challenge as them. “We have teams across all the challenges this year, so everyone is going to see some competition and everyone is going to be able to see other kids in the same challenge as them,” she said. “They’ll see how other kids think about the same problem and see how kids think about different problems across the spectrum.”

Wisconsin DI Affiliate Director Mary Bykowski said this year’s tournament was bigger than last year’s, with more than 20 additional teams attending.

“We’ve been trying to build our teams throughout the year, so there’s new people and new faces,” she said. “We’re so excited to see the kids on tournament day. When you walk in the door, the excitement is hard to explain unless you’ve been there… It’s in the air and the kids are excited.”

That excitement, Bykowski said, prevails for many teams regardless of the outcome of the tournament.

“Even at the end of the day, if things didn’t go so well, they’re just happy to come and watch other kids and do their thing and just be part of it,” she said. “Because of how the Destination Imagination experience is structured, it’s all the kids. It’s their work, their writing, their costumes, their concepts without adult interference — whether you’re at your sectional tournament or the state tournament. But to come here and get to put on your performance, knowing that these were all the best teams in the state and you’re going to perform with those teams, it’s such an amazing feeling. To be a part of that, I think, is really a cool thing for the kids.”

And regardless of how a team placed at Saturday’s tournament, Becker said the skills learned in DI are something participants will carry with them for life.

“There’s not a single day that goes by where I don’t use something that I learned in DI,” she said. “I’m a project manager by day, and so I use all of those project management skills I learned in my time in DI. As a kid, I would not be confident enough to be doing a press interview right now or get up on a stage. Those are all skills that I was able to practice as a result of DI. I see kids who maybe don’t otherwise get the opportunity to have their ideas heard, but they get to do that in DI which is just magical for them and for building their confidence and skills for their futures and careers.”

From the Algoma School District, the DI-no Nuggets placed second in the secondary level of the technical challenge, Donut You Know Our Name placed first in the elementary level of the scientific challenge, Team Rocket placed fourth in the secondary level of the improvisation challenge and the Big Feet Monkeys placed sixth in the elementary level of the service learning challenge.

Each team placing first through third at Saturday’s tournament earned an invite to Global Finals to compete against teams from around the world in Kansas City at the end of May.

Learn more about Wisconsin Destination Imagination at wisconsindi.org.