Students from across Southwestern Virginia will compete from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m on Monday, March 5 in the 2018 Southwestern KidWind Challenge at the Science Museum of Western Virginia in Roanoke.
The Center for Wind Energy at James Madison University (JMU), works annually with local organizations such as the Science Museum in Western Virginia, to host regional KidWind Challenges in eastern, northern, and southwestern Virginia.
The KidWind Challenge is a competition for elementary, middle, and high school students that incorporates engineering, science, alternative energy, and sustainability. Teams of students will compete to build small-scale wind turbines that generate electricity and will present their turbines to a panel of judges.
This year, in addition to being the local host of the Southwestern Virginia KidWind Challenge, the Science Museum of Western Virginia has partnered with Roanoke County Public Schools through a Twenty-first Century CLC grant to prepare eight teams from local Roanoke schools for the Challenge.
The Southwestern Virginia KidWind Challenge will also be piloting a new Advance Wind Challenge where teams will build their own generators and give a presentation on a current topic in wind energy, focused this year on offshore wind development.
Judges for this new challenge will be from the Virginia offshore wind industry, such as Dominion Energy (the main sponsor of the event). Schools competing in the Advanced Wind Challenge from Bath County and Albemarle High Schools.
Schools competing in the middle school division include Morningside, Westside, Round Hill, Garden City, Hurt Park and Valley Elementary Schools; and Stonewall Jackson, Woodrow Wilson, Jack Jouett and Kate Collins Middle Schools, Elkton Elementary School, River Bend Elementary School, and North Branch Schools.
Schools competing in the high school division include Rockbridge County and William Fleming High Schools.
More information about the Virginia KidWind Challenge is available at https://virginiakwc.wixsite.com/kwcva.
More information about the KidWind Challenge is available at https://www.kidwindchallenge.org/
