HSD Gifted Education Students Excel at Academic Challenge Cup 2012

The Creative All-Stars, a team of third grade (HSD) gifted education students, competed in the Gifted Resource Council’s Academic Challenge Cup 2012, which took place at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. The team was one of four that achieved a level of excellence.

Academic Challenge Cup is a series of academic competitions in math, language skills and creative problem-solving for students in grades two through eight, according to the council website. The competition in which HSD students did well is called Creative Convention. It is designed for second and third grade student. Twenty-eight teams from 17 school districts competed.

Coach and gifted education teacher Michelle Binuyo led HSD's two teams of students. The Creative Convention teams worked together to develop, designed and constructed a solution to a lifestyle problem as part of the competition. Teams were scored on teamwork and creative problem-solving.

Eve Shelton attends and said she enjoyed seeing her team's hard work pay off.

“There were different colored rings and we had to stack them the same way as the leader," she said. "Every time, we won. That’s the best part.”

The Creative All-Stars had to design and create a monument of peace from common items and decide whether to place it in front of their school or in Washington, D.C.

We were judged on teamwork and we were one of the teams that had the most teamwork,” said Keegan Irizarry, who attends Brown Elementary.

Binuyo said attainging a level of excellence is a great feat for the district and the students. Camryn Callahan, who goes to Walker Elementary, and Aiden Dougherty, who attends Cold Water Elementary comprise the rest of the team.

“I believe they are one of the first teams here at GALACTIC to achieve this level of excellence in a competition,"Binuyo said. “It’s a great accomplishment.”

Another team, the 4Gs (4 Girls), comprised of Maycee Hopkins and Libby Kentch of Garrett Elementary, Jenny Nguyen of Brown Elementary and Lilly Samson of Walker Elementary, also participated.

Binuyo also said the students were really excited and gave thier full effort.

"They did really well explaining their project and how people will benefit from this project," she said.