Today (Wednesday, Dec. 9, 2015) 10 teams of Penn students (47 students in all) competed in the 5th annual Whirlpool Innovation Challenge at the World Headquarters in Benton Harbor, Michigan.
 

"Team F," an all-female team, won first place with their concept in the “Traveler Edition Water Filtering Solution” challenge category. And for the first time ever in the years of the event ... Whirlpool chose the winning student team’s concept to develop further. Whirlpool liked the idea so much they will continue to work with the team and hopefully bring the product to market very soon!!! Team F members include: Julia Kwak (P-H-M Board Ambassador), Gracie Geschke, Hannah Keeler, Alexis Marks and Maddie Thurin and are students in Mr. Jim Sauer’s class.

 

The annual Whirlpool Innovation Challenge provides Penn STEM students with real world problem solving learning opportunities. Whirlpool provides the students with several challenges of which to choose from and then develop a product based on the chellange. This year’s theme centered on water filtration.

At the beginning of the semester, STEM students decide to participate in the Whirlpool Innovation Challenge or another type of problem based learning project. For months, the teams have worked on their concepts. Two weeks ago all the teams competed for the opportunity to be among the top 10 finalists teams that would make their pitch before Whirlpool Executives. Today was the culmination of months of work.

At today’s final pitch, all 10 teams gave a short time presentation and then answered questions from the Whirlpool panelists. Then during an “exposition”-type fair, students answered questions about their projects from Whirlpool employees. Anyone was able to vote. Winners were chosen from the votes along with input from teachers and the Whirlpool executive judges.

The 2^nd place team, “Team R” was made up of students from Mr. Jim Langfeldt’s class: Katie Lo, Jack Neubauer, Zach Simon and two other students. Their challenge was “Elevating Water.”

“Team W” members won 3^rd Place, also from Mr. Langfeldt’s class, were Cassidee Centilli, Sydney Cole, Nathan Doshi, Grant Harrington and Justin Ralston. They chose the “Traveler Edition Water Filtering Solution” as their team challenge.

Mr. Sauer’s “Team C,” made up of Alex Dobbins, Andrew Fair, Andrew Fuller, Logan McGuire and Emmanuel Smith won Best Presentation and Employee Choice Awards for their idea for the “EveryDrop Auto-filling Pitcher” challenge.

All teams walked away with a certificate from Whirlpool and prizes like EveryDrop gortex jackets, water bottles, reusable hot/cold grocery bags, cell phone chargers and some pretty cool sunglasses! But more importantly the great opportunity to participate in a real-world business competition.