Philo-Hill Students
win state award, earn
$5,000 for school
BY KIM UNDERWOOD
WINSTON-SALEM/FORSYTH
COUNTY SCHOOLS
SPECIAL TO THE
CHRONICLE
Working with teacher
Juanita Ramsey, a team of
five students at Philo-Hill
Magnet Academy created a
design for a telephone app
called Aged-Out Help that
won first place in the state
out of more than 1,200
entries and went on to be
chosen as one of the
regional winners.
"I am extremely excited
and proud of my wonderful
students," Ramsey said.
Student Zach Gittings
said he was so excited by
the news that he was still
wondering whether he was
, dreaming.
"I'm pretty sure I'm
acWn rioht nnw " -
"e1" i,v"?
he said.
Along with
being a member of
the N.C. House of
Representatives,
Evelyn Terry is a
long-time friend of
Ramsey^ who
sometimes helps
with school proj- ga
ects.
"I am so proud of these
children and my friend,"
Terry said. "I know of her
dedication as a teacher."
It's good to see Ramsey
and the students receive
such positive attention,
Terry said. "I told them this
afternoon when I came,
'You are all stars to me."'
The app, which is
designed to help young
people who becomfe too old
to Ire served by foster care,
was in the running for a
national award. On
Thursday, Jan. 20, the stu
dents made a 15-minute
live online presentation to
the national judges.
" The state award came
with $5,000 for the school
to use to enhance its STEM
(science, technology, engi
neering, mathematics) edu
cation. Principal Kenyatta
Bennett can ponder how
the money might best serve
the school.
Ramsey teaches busi
ness, finance and informa
tion technology. For win
ning the "State, the seventh
and eighth-graders on the
team ~ Ja'ya Jackson,
Ayniah Duncan, Anthony
Sturdivant, Larry Clary and
Zach Gittings ? will also
receive a tablet computer.
By some state criteria,
Philo-Hill is considered a
low-performing school.
This award shows, Bennett
said, that students and
teachers at Philo-Hill are
working hard. "It means
validation for the work<that
we do ... Regardless of
labels, students are learning
and growing. Real-world
problem-solving is alive
and well at Philo-Hill."
When the students
heard about the 2015
Verizon Innovative App
Challenge in October, they
decided to take it on,
designing an application
(app) that could be used on
a wireless phone as a class
project.
Deciding what they
wanted the app to focus on
proved to be pretty
straightforward. All of the
students on the ^am know
young people who are or
were in foster care.
"We have a lot of foster
kids at this school," said i
Jackson.
"My stepdad and his
four siblings were foster
kids," Duncan said. "They
went through a lot."
Her father was also in
foster care, she said.
The team members
quickly came to a consen
sus about designing an app
that would help those
young people find
resources and would be a
way to serve individuals
and the wider community. i
"Everybody was on
board with it," Sturdivant <
said. "We all came togeth
er."
"I like to help people,"
Clary said.
When they
looked to\see
whether such._;
apps already
existed else
where, they
found, in gener
al, very littie. As
for this commu
nity. in particu
lar, they learned
msey that, although it
has a number of
nonprofit organizations,
churches and businesses
that serve people who are
homeless or need help in
other ways, there was no
app specifically designed
to help young people on
their own after aging out of
foster care to find the nec
essary resources.
So they went to work
designing an app and doing
the research to support it. "I
never realized how serious
aging out was until we
started working on this
app," Sturdivant said.
"It's a big problem in
our community ..."
Duncan said.
"... that needs to be
solved," Jackson added.
Being on your own is a
big deal, and someone in
that situation may need
help with finding a place to
live, with finding a job,
with pursuing their educa
tional goals and much
more. Among the facts they
discovered were that 42
percent of such young peo
ple become homeless at
some point, 45 percent
don't complete high school
or earn a GED high school
equivalency certification,
68 percent have no -natural
support system, and 29 per
cent become single parents.
The contest require
ments included answering
a series of questions and
creating a video "commer
cial" about the app for
judges to watch. Making
the video proved to be lots
of fun. The other students
joked that Clary, who
played the young man who
had aged out of foster care,
had the easiest job because
he had no lines and just had
to concentrate on looking
hurt and distressed while
the rest of them had to learn
and recite lines about how
the app worked and what
support services are avail
able.
Ramsey said she was
proud of the students for
sticking with the project.
When they started, she
said, no one realized how
much work i^ would
require. The students
stayed after school and
worked on weekends,
doing whatever was neces- ?
sary.
"It was a lot of hard
work but it paid off,"
Ramsey said.
Philo-Hill. was in the
South Region, which
includes 11 states.
The eight Best in
Nation winners - one high
school and one middle
school from each of the
four regions - was
announced on Feb. 2.
Philo-Hill did not win. See
the results at
http://appchallenge .tsaweb.
org/sites/appchallenge .tsa
web.org/files/press
roo m/B e stN at io n
pdf%20for%20website 1 -
flat.pdf.
=7
WS/FCS photo*
Teacher Juanita Ramsey
and the five students she
worked with show the
plaque they won from
the state of North
Carolina.
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