After achieving honors for creativity, teamwork and innovation in regional and state academic tournaments, two teams from Greenbrier County have earned the right to compete in Destination Imagination’s Global Finals, the world’s largest celebration of student creativity, to be held May 24-27 in Knoxville, Tennessee.

In an amazing and almost impossible turn of events, the two teams, who were competing against each other and other schools from all over the state at the West Virginia Tournament, ended up tying for first place!

Team members from Lewisburg Elementary include: Jakob Tomlinson, Gavin Cherry, Sofie Kelso, Nathaniel Vincent, Nixon Brown, and Grayson Dull.Team members from Frankford Elementary students include: Luella Mansheim, Landon Gurley, Carter Higginbotham, Dawson Trusty, Calvin Roberts, and Cole Morgan. These students participate in Destination Imagination as part of the Greenbrier County Schools Gifted and Talented program, led by their teacher and team manager Jason Johans.

These teams will compete with other teams in the Top Secret Challenge, one of seven, open-ended challenges that require students to apply science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) skills, in addition to their talents in improvisation, theater arts, writing, project management, communication, innovation, teamwork, community service and social entrepreneurship.

“Destination Imagination is an amazing program that promotes collaborative, creative problem solving and scientific research. These teams really went above and beyond to achieve top honors at the state level. We are now raising funds for our trip to Global Finals, the GoFundMe page is active. Any help would be greatly appreciated.” said Jason Johans, Team Manager of Team Genius.

“We are so excited and can’t wait for our trip! We have worked very hard together to make it this far. We love Destination Imagination. It lets us learn how to be creative and work together while also having fun!” said Jakob Tomlinson, student on the Lewisburg team.

Destination Imagination (DI) has had a positive impact on more than 1.5 million students who have taken part in its acclaimed academic program. This year, more than 150,000 students haveparticipatedin tournaments throughout the U.S., as well as 30 countries,in hopes of earning a spot at the Global Finals competition in May.

These teams are among the 8,000 students representing more than 1,400 teams that have advanced to participate in Global Finals 2017. The teams are currently fundraising to cover some expenses of their trip.

“The Destination Imagination program is a fun, hands-on system of learning that fosters students’ creativity, courage and curiosity,” said Chuck Cadle, CEO of Destination Imagination. “Collaborative problem solving, risk taking, project management and thinking on your feet are just a few of the important skills learned in our program.”

Destination Imagination is a leader in project-based learning opportunities that blends STEM education with the arts and social entrepreneurship.Its academic Challenges are student-directed and are designed to teach kids how to think, not what to think. Teams who participate have the opportunity to present their solutions at regional and state tournaments.

For more information about Global Finals, visit http://globalfinals.org/.

If you would like to help by donating funds towards this experience, please contact Team Manager Jason Johans at 304-661-6497 or visit the GoFundMe page at www.gofundme.com/global-finals-competition