Gibran McDuffie is the coordinator of the High School Computer Competition (HSCC) efforts implemented by our BDPA Chicago chapter. His team won the 2006 National BDPA HSCC Championships held in Los Angeles, CA. Gibran took the time to document the long road to that championship. This is 'must reading' for any student, instructor, volunteer or supporter of BDPA's high school computer competition. Kudos to Gibran for taking time to document the process and road taken by BDPA Detroit chapter. One BDPA!

1. Route 66
The Road to the 2006 High School Computer Competition Championship
By Gibran McDuffie
Route 66 was one of the earliest additions to the federal highway system. It began in Chicago and ended in
Los Angeles. Along the way, travelers would pass through Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico,
and Arizona before ending their journey in California. The road our students took to L.A. did not traverse as
many states, but it certainly was as adventurous and challenging as Route 66 was when it opened in 1926, 80
years before we landed in Los Angeles to complete our journey to the 2006 High School Computer
Competition Championship.
In 2003, Albert McDonald and I traveled to Philadelphia with a group of seniors. These young men had been
trained to develop web applications utilizing Java Server Pages (JSP). They were an excellent group of students
and had been in the program 3 years or more. They were able to translate their dedication to an impressive
third place showing. The following year, Albert asked me to take a leadership role in developing our training
program. Albert recruited some great students, Lee Reed, Letisha Logan, and Charise McSwine among them.
However, it was the first year in the program for all of them. The students from the prior year were in college,
one a West Point cadet. To make matters worse, our lead trainer moved to another city earlier in the year.
The long and short of it was, we had to rebuild our entire program from the ground up.
Following our success in Philadelphia, I wanted to continue teaching the students JSP; however, the book the
students had been using for the past couple of years was out of print. I soon realized the job I’d undertaken
was much bigger than I’d imagined. I hadn’t been a programmer for 7 years, our chief technical guy was
gone, and obviously the technology had changed immensely since I’d put anything into production. I knew
the first order of business was to find a text book. We needed 20 JSP books to start training. The clock was
ticking and I ended up ordering the only book I could find a large enough supply to start the program. When
the books finally arrived, I reviewed it to plan the training, but what I saw on the pages of the book was very
foreign to me!
While the technology the book is based on remains JSP, the focus of the book is the Java Standard Tag Library
(JSTL). I had a very superficial understanding of JSTL. In my attempts to stay abreast of technology, I’d written
a little tag of my own.; however, JSTL is a rich library of tags accompanied by it’s own expression language
which I knew nothing about. So there I was, tasked with overhauling the program, learning a new language,
teaching it to students at the same time, and recruiting others to help dig me out of the jam I was in.
Fortunately, the students made lemonade out of the lemons we’d been served. The 2004 conference was
held in Dallas, Texas. Lee Reed, Charise McSwine, Iman McDuffie, Shannon Pelote, and Tashe Majors-
Newsome allowed our chapter to earn a respectable 12th place out of 21 contesting teams. We had averted a
total disaster on our first stop on Route 66. The experience gave the students the confidence to believe they
could do well if they had a solid training program to support their efforts.
That fall, I formally accepted the HSCCT Coordinator responsibilities. With the lessons learned that year,
Albert and I went to work to take the team to the next level. I was able to get Brian Moore of Allstate and
James Jackson an independent consultant to agree to develop a database training program and deliver it. I

2. Page 2 Route 66
also reached out to Adrian Cooley of AT&T to agree to share the load of delivering the Java training and
become the program chief technical architect. Albert McDonald recruited former HSCCT student Jeremy Jones
to be Assistant HSCCT Coordinator.
In the course of the 2004 training, we learned that the JSP book we were using was not conducive to
introducing students to JSTL. On the upside, we learned there are huge benefits to teaching the students JSTL
rather than native Java or JSP. The JSTL expression language is non-typed – meaning, developers don’t have
to worry about data types such as: char, int, float, double, etc., when creating and using variables. JSTL takes
care of all type conversions behind the scenes. It also eliminates the need to define any middle level
architecture features such as an object model or framework. JSTL developers are free to focus on the
functionality required in the web pages rather than the nuances of a programming language.
I knew we needed a better book if we wanted the students to fully grasp the technology. After searching the
web, book stores, and talking to colleagues, I found JSTL in Action by Shawn Bayern. While it’s not written to
the latest specification of the language, it is written specifically to introduce non-programmers to the
technology. Armed with a good text book and a great team, we began to layout the fundamentals of the
program.
I wanted the volunteers involved with the program to bring the same enthusiasm, charisma, and discipline that
is found in all successful sports programs. Accordingly, I titled anyone involved with program delivery a
Coach. I also wanted a performance based method for selecting students participating in the program. I
created a quiz for each week of HTML and JSTL training. Coach Moore created quizzes for the database
training. We determined we would collect the scores the students earned every week, and select the highest
scoring students to represent us. Every week of training, we report to the students and parents providing an
assessment of where we are, the issues to be addressed, and the student’s standing in the program. We also
give movie tickets to the student that scores the most points or makes the most progress.
Coach Moore and I believed we also needed some way of assessing which students would do well in the
program. We’d planned to use this assessment in the event we had more students trying out for the program
than we could accommodate (that glorious day hasn’t arrived yet). Once more a search of the web and book
stores ensued. After much trial and error, we were able to develop a programmer aptitude test that has
accurately predicted which students would be successful in our program.
The most controversial decision we made for the new training program were new requirements that all
participating students have access to a computer upon which they have administrator rights and access to the
internet. Effectively, we were requiring students to have their own computer along with internet access.
Historically, one of the program objectives was to expose disadvantaged students to technology. We were re-
envisioning the program. In part, our rationale rested on the fact that the overwhelming majority of the
students trying out for the program did in fact have a computer and internet access. This circumstance
allowed us to introduce some efficiencies that we would not otherwise be able to take advantage of. For
example, being that our technology is all open source, the students are able to install all of the technology we
use on their home computers, and develop their skills at home instead of solely relying on access to our
training facility.

3. Page 3 Route 66
The inconvenient truth is, students attending the competition without a complete knowledge of how to
configure their systems, end up being stumped the first time they run into a wrinkle in their environment that
is different from what they’ve been trained on. Further, we also have the High School Computer Club which
introduces kids to technology without the restraint of owning a computer.
Last year we started our training in February, a full month earlier than we had in previous years. The 21
students that participated in the program learned on day one, that we were serious about the program and
serious about winning. The coaches and I made it clear that our goal was to find 5 students we could take to
Detroit and win a victory. We were buoyed by the fact that the National Coordinators had modified the
program to place more emphasis on the programming aspect of the competition. A chapter had won the
competition 4 years in a row in large part because the written exam is a computer based test that at that time,
covered the same questions every year. Students could score really high by memorizing the material they
could count on being on the test. There were several years where the team with the best programmers lost
badly to teams that had memorized the material on the written exam.
With Coach Cooley leading our JSTL training, I knew we would be a strong programming team. I also knew
that Coach Moore had developed an excellent database training curriculum. We were very confident we had
developed a solid program for the students to flourish in. Students returning to the program from the prior
year could feel the difference too. The leaders emerged early in the training. The brilliant Lee Reed returned
to take the lead in scoring points and did not relinquish the lead all year. Deante Morgan, a senior from CVS
with training in C++ demonstrated that his high score on the programmer aptitude test was not a fluke.
Charise McSwine brought her two years of experience and natural leadership abilities to push students to work
harder and stay focused in class. Letisha Logan, a student that just missed making the team the prior year by
a hair, was determined to make the team that year without question. Maurice Shelton was a student that had
participated in the program in 2003 and went AWOL in 2004, returned to the program with his great
ebullience and enthusiasm.
As these five students began to emerge as the leaders in the program, I received an invitation to attend the
Midwest Regional Competition in Cincinnati. This event is a condensed, sort of watered down version of the
national competition. It allows students to get a feel for what to expect when they attend the big game. Al
McDonald and I agreed it would be beneficial for the team to attend, and Al was able to secure support from
the board of directors for us to go. That May when we embarked on the next leg of our Route 66 journey, we
were about 90% through the training. Our plan was to spend the winter and spring training the students, and
the summer honing their skills and team building.
The troop that landed in Cincinnati had strong technical abilities, but had not yet jelled as a team.
Nonetheless, the students were able to demonstrate the promise within them and earned a strong victory at
the competition. Unfortunately, it may have translated to overconfidence. After winning the Midwest
Regional, we didn’t have another session where all the students showed up for class. Often, there’d only be
one student in class. It was a very difficult circumstance and a challenge we still do not fully have a handle on.
It’s not that the students were spending their summer at the beach instead of class. Each of them were
involved with very positive things that simply made it difficult for them to be where I needed them to be. One
student worked two jobs, one was in and out of town making arrangements to attend college, another
attended football camp, and on, and on.

4. Page 4 Route 66
By the time we were ready to leave for Detroit, I was dubious about our prospects. We had not jelled as a team
and I knew we were not as technically strong as we should be or could be. Then we blew a tire on our journey
down Route 66. Deante Morgan was one of the strongest JSTL programmers on the team. Unfortunately, he
learned just before we were scheduled to leave for Detroit he would have to start college in the middle of the
competition. We’d have to meet our challengers without him. My heart sank. However, after we arrived at the
competition, we learned that the current champions had decided not to attend at the last minute. I thought
“maybe we have a shot after all”, but it was not to be. The Southern Minnesota, New Jersey, and Hartford
teams were simply awesome.
I took the loss hard. I didn’t mind losing if we’d given our all, but the effort we’d put into the program over
the summer let me know we didn’t deserve to be in contention. I wasn’t only angry with the students, I was
angry with myself. Over the summer if only 1 or 2 students showed up, I’d end training early or cancel it
altogether instead of spending the scheduled time with whoever was there. We’d driven to Detroit. The ride
home was a difficult one. I hadn’t said much to the students about our 5th place showing. The students felt
they deserved to be congratulated for their improvement over the prior year. I didn’t. They questioned me
about it and I went Mike Ditka on them (but not Bobby Knight). No football or basketball coach would accept
less than 100% effort from their team and I’m not going to either – especially when the results are less than
satisfactory.
It took a few weeks but I was able to pull myself together and began to work on the 2006 program. I knew we
were a level 2 organization on the capability maturity model, meaning, we have a managed, repeatable process
for success. However, I’d learned from the students there were some key improvements to the program that
needed to be made. Several students complained we had an over reliance on quizzes. They pointed out that
simply because a student had studied the book, it didn’t necessarily translate into programming ability. The
coaches also weighed in on the less than optimal training facility we were using. Following their
recommendations, we introduced practical exams at the end of every major section of training. To complete a
practical exam, the students are given a business problem to solve, and they must use their training to provide
a solution in two hours. Each solution is judged by a committee of coaches. We also garnered support from
the Illinois Institute of Technology. They agreed to allow us to conduct our training in one of their best
computer laboratories.
In the spring of 2005, a mom was looking for a computer related program for her precocious son, and found
BDPA on the internet. She contacted Al McDonald who invited her and her son to one of our training sessions.
The young man she introduced us to is Andreaus Robinson, and he would prove to be the final piece of the
puzzle we needed to ensure a victory at the end of Route 66. When Andreaus showed up that day, he was
armed with a couple of computer games he’d developed in Visual Basic. I had a Michael Jordan in Lee Reed,
now I’d have my Scotty Pippen too. We were too far in the program for Andreaus to start that year, but we
stayed in contact with him to ensure he participated this year.
We have a long term vision of the High School Computer Competition program where everything will be
automated. The students will take quizzes online, the quizzes will be automatically scored, the scores will
automatically show up in their points, and their standing in the program will automatically be reflected.
Additionally, students will be able to register for the program online, and we’ll be able to manage scholarships
through the system along with other capabilities. We’re not there yet, but we took a big step toward getting
there this year. I dug into my shallow pockets and registered hscct-chicago.net. I also signed up for a web

5. Page 5 Route 66
service that allows us to develop and host web applications. Having these facilities in place, Coach Cooley
developed a web application that allows us to enter the points the students earn during training. The students
see their standing in the program by logging in, and they can also maintain their profile information. We
hope to build upon these capabilities over the next year.
2005 was an election year for our chapter. We elected a new set of officers and Albert McDonald decided he
wanted to serve the chapter in a new capacity. Our new President, Yvette Graham asked if I’d try to fill the big
shoes Albert was stepping out of. Although I had some trepidation, I realized it was the next logical step for
me.
This year we started training on January 7th. A full month earlier than the prior year, and 2 months earlier
than 2004. We began with 19 students, but that quickly dwindled to 14. I had a goal to enter the summer
with 10 kids battling it out for positions on the team. I thought that would force kids to stay involved with the
program and weigh their priorities. However, by April it was clear there were just 6 students with the level of
commitment required of a champion. Some students were familiar and expected, others were new and
surprising. Of course the great Lee Reed returned. Though a fierce competitor, he was encouraged that other
students were able to best the top scoring honors from him. Maurice Shelton led the team this year with the
highest number of points scored and also demonstrated a firm grasp of the programming concepts he’d
learned over the past two years. Andreaus Robinson showed that he is the real deal, accumulating the second
highest number of points in his first year in the program. Letisha Logan, was our database administrator the
prior year and brought 3 years of solid database experience with her. Joseph Huggins was an 8th grader with
the maturity and focus of a high school Senior. Carlton Means is Lee Reed’s cousin proving that good genes
does matter.
We’d decided we’d return to the Midwest Regional Competition. Since the minimal make up of a team is 3,
and the Midwest Regional allows chapters to send more than one team, we decided to send two. Team A was
comprised of: Lee, Andreaus, and Carlton. Team B included: Maurice, Letisha, and Joe. Al Wilson is a long
time BDPA member that had been helping me keep the kids focused in the classroom. He and other members
like Greg Davison bought the kids lunch and given them rides home from class. Al knew I’d need some help
with so many teenagers, and agreed to drive his van to Cincinnati. Leticia’s mom, and Joseph Huggin’s dad
also met us there. We had a full cheering section for our kids. At the end of the competition, Team A won
first place, and Team B second place. I was feeling the magic again. We were barreling down Route 66 with
the top down and the wind in our hair. Maybe leaving the top down wasn’t such a good idea…
It was summer again and all the high school upper classmen had other things to do. The University of Texas
was wooing Lee with a two week tour of their facility. Andreaus had an internship at DePaul University and
also spent a week in Washington D.C. where he took second place in the NAACP Act-So computer competition.
Leticia had graduated and was working a summer job and making plans to attend college. The only student
we could count on being in class was young Joseph Huggins but even he had summer vacation plans with his
family.
I felt strongly that we needed the summer to jell as a team and to hone our programming skills. Additionally,
the Southern Minnesota team had performed so well on the programming part of the competition last year, I
knew their main area of growth had to be the written part of the exam. I’d enlisted Rodney Sanders of ABN
Amro to develop a program to teach the students computer science. With everyone showing up so irregularly,

6. Page 6 Route 66
his job was made all the more difficult having to go over the same material several times to ensure everyone
benefited from the lessons he’d prepared.
However, the big lesson we’d learned last year was that as long as we have one student in class, we needed to
press on. We were more flexible this year and readily diverged from our lesson plans and focused on the
training needs of the students that showed up. It’s not the optimal situation but it is probably a reality we
have to accept during the summer. Bright kids like ours are always going to have other opportunities to
explore, and families aren’t going to stop going on vacation just so we can win competitions. As a matter of
fact, I took my family on vacation this summer.
Accepting our circumstances is one thing, rolling over dead is something else. At the end of July, the students
and I agreed we needed to make up for lost time. The good news was that even though the students weren’t
coming to class, they were studying and writing code on their own . They just needed their coach to help
them with the finer points and they needed more time together as a team. A week before the conference, we
met at the BDPA Technology Center every night after work for 4 hours of intense development. It was
wonderful. The students weren’t goofing off , or joking around. They knew it was the 4th quarter and we were
out of time-outs. They were unselfish and demonstrably unstoppable!
It was time to put the peddle to the metal. We had established good momentum heading into the competition
and decided to keep it going once we arrived in Los Angeles early Tuesday afternoon. After checking into the
hotel, we did a little reconnaissance on the area, got some lunch, then tramped back into our room to write
more code. We’d spent the last week working on the problems from previous competitions. One that proved
most beneficial was the video rental system from 2004. In this problem, the students had to develop a
system that included functionality to allow customers to search a video library, select movies by genre, show a
history of movies previously rented, sort videos by selected criteria, view movie details, order a movie, etc. In
the competition, they only get 7 hours to solve a problem and that is all they spent on each problem preparing
for the competition. At this point, the students cut me out of the process. They didn’t want my help, didn’t
want me looking over their shoulders, didn’t really want me in the room.
The first day of the conference there is a student breakfast which is sort of a pep rally. The last couple of
years it has been led by our inspirational immediate past national president Wayne Hicks. Wayne does an
excellent job getting the students fired up about the conference and the competition. The students get to see
kids they’ve met at previous competitions and to meet new students from all over the country. The
Wednesday of the conference is the calm before the storm. In addition to the ~100 students that attend the
conference for the competition, there is another ~100 students that attend for the Youth Technology
Conference. There are student workshops every day that all of the students can attend. Since the competition
doesn’t start until Thursday, our guys attended some workshops that morning, but after lunch, they headed
back to our room to write more code.
The opening ceremony of the conference was Wednesday evening. Various conference dignitaries spoke about
what the attendees could expect over the course of the next several days, followed by an address by the
keynote speaker. Past speakers have included Mae Jemison, the first African American female astronaut, a
Chicago native and graduate of Morgan Park high school. Last year Omar Wassow, creator of the Black Planet
web portal, opened the conference. This year Farrah Gray, another Chicago native, set the pace for the
conference. His story of self-reliance and entrepreneurship was a lesson to be learned by students and adults.

7. Page 7 Route 66
The competition starts on Thursday of the conference. The students have to be at breakfast by 7:00 a.m. or
fines follow. Kraft Foods has hosted the breakfast for the past few years. They usually have an executive
introduce an officer of the company that imparts some words of wisdom and advice. After breakfast, the kids
head to the oral competition. During this part of the competition, each team is asked a question in 5 rounds.
Each question is worth 10 points. The first round covers BDPA history, next its computer science, then
computer hardware, followed by data representation, and finally HTML. The moderator kept serving the
questions up, and our kids kept knocking them out the park!
After the oral competition, the students were served lunch. After lunch, the students headed for the written
competition. The students are taken to a holding area, and then one by one they are taken to the laboratory
to take the written exam which tests their knowledge of computer science. The kids are given 15 minutes to
answer 300 questions. Obviously no student answers all the questions. Some questions require students to
translate data from binary to octal, and octal to hexadecimal, which as you know can be time consuming.
Since wrong answers aren’t counted against you, I recommend the students just guess on these type of
questions and jet to the next one, but not all of them followed my advice. Regardless, our team scored the
second highest average score in the competition behind Southern Minnesota. Overall, combining our Oral and
Written scores, we were running second behind last year’s champions.
Thursday evening they allow each team to analyze the systems they will use during the Programming
competition. Almost immediately we ran into a problem with our environment. For some reason, two web
servers were running and competing for the same resources. We couldn’t get the system to see any of the
components we deployed. Fortunately we were able to assess the situation, and with help from the onsite
technicians, we were able to kill the errant process. We continued with our inspection of the system, created a
small application and deployed it, then left the laboratory brimming with confidence. I went to bed that night
sure we had a lock on 3rd place.
Breakfast Friday morning was a solemn occasion. Some teams had poured most of their effort into teaching
their students programming, and at this point it was costing them a position in the top 10. No one knew the
complete picture, but experienced program coordinators know when their team is doing well. A snap shot of
the top 10 in the standings at that point would have shown the following: Southern Minnesota, Chicago,
Cincinnati and Dayton tied for third, Twin Cities, Los Angeles, Austin, D.C., Chattanooga, Richmond, and
Hartford.
I don’t remember what was served for breakfast and I think it had more to do with the late night greasy
burgers he digested, but as we headed toward the programming competition to receive the instructions from
the judges, our captain, Lee Reed became nauseas. My concerns about the competition vanished momentarily
as they were supplanted by worry for this young man for whom I have such high regard. While I attended to
Lee in the bathroom, Mr. Huggins rushed to the hotel commissary and purchased some medicine. It wasn’t
long before Lee’s stomach settled and we caught up with the rest of the team as the judge continued to lay
down the law and review the programming problem.
The competition problem is frequently topical. I’m not prescient just an experienced program coordinator. I’d
told the students I’d be shocked if the competition problem didn’t have something to do with hurricane
Katrina. This year the assignment was “to create a ‘Donate for Disaster Relief’ application where someone can

8. Page 8 Route 66
choose from one or more charities and make a donation, all from one web site. Charities can also use the site
to see how much money has been raised for their organization.” There are 3 roles in the system: New donor,
Returning Donor, and Charity. Once logged in, donors should be able to: Display their donations, create/edit
their profile, Make a donation, and checkout. Charities should be able to retrieve a report of the donations
they have received. The system also had to have role-based security functionality. The system required the
students to implement session management such that all the activity of a donor was captured in temporary
tables until they checked out. I’m glossing over some of the details of the requirements but I think you can
see this would be a real challenge for most programmers to complete in 7 hours.
Seven hours. Seven hours to digest the requirements, analyze the database, and decompose the work. Seven
hours to design a system, create wire frames, flow charts, and test plans. Seven hours to layout where all the
ancillary files and images reside, assign variable and file names, start writing some code. Seven hours to start
testing, figure out bugs, scrap a piece of design, redesign it, code it, test it, implement it. All the while staying
cool, cool, cool. The judges must not see you arguing. The judges must not see you frustrated. The judges
must see an entire team working together, everyone involved and engaged. Code, test, fix. Code, test fix.
Code, test, fix.
“Joe, how are those screen mock-ups coming along. As soon as you’re done with that, please start on the test
cases for the new donors functionality.” “Maurice, your design to list the donations for a returning donor is
perfect. Does it include the database processing to limit the number of contributions displayed to 5 per
page?” “Dre, I think I goofed on the update profile routine, it’s not going to work the way I have it. I need you
to help me with it and pick up the session management processing later” “Lee, the design of the pages was
fine before I saw what they look like once the images are loaded. I’m going to have to make some changes to
the page layout if this is ever going to look right!”.
One Team, one computer. Must manage the clock, and must mange time at the keyboard. Code, test, fix.
Code, test, fix. Code, test, fix. At 2:00, the captain scans the room. The team against the wall has been
arguing all day. They’re not gonna make it. It looks like one girl is doing all the coding for the team behind
us. Over there, everyone is working like a well oiled machine. One kid is asleep at the table next to us. In the
far corner, it seems like that team has been laughing and joking since lunch, have they finished or given up?
Ok, focus. Looks like Maurice has a break through on the user checkout functionality, nice to see him high-
fiving Andreaus. Hey, I think it’s time we start thinking about our presentation to the judges. Let Joe keep
testing while we work on our delivery. Yikes, he’s found something I need to jump on. Joe let me back at the
keyboard to debug this while you guys keep working on your presentation. Code, test, fix. Code, test, fix.
Code, test, fix… Seven hours. Just a fraction of the time spent training to get here. Has it all been wasted?
Will Coach Gibran go ballistic again if we don’t win, place, or show?
For young Maurice, this was his last chance for glory. The rest of the kids can come back next year, but
everyone knew that this was a team that should win. After the programming was done, Coach Sanders and Mr.
Huggins picked the students up. The Chicago board of directors held a reception for them so they could wind
down after the grueling competition. I have family in L.A. and was spending time with them. Later that
evening, Mr. Huggins and his dad piled the kids into his car and took them into the city to do a little site
seeing.

9. Page 9 Route 66
Saturday the kids spent the day at Six Flags, while I attended meetings with the program coordinators. After
reviewing how things went during the programming competition, I was feeling very confident about our lock
on 3rd. All I ever wanted to do was help the kids earn some scholarship money and earn some bragging rights
for the chapter. Third place would let us do that and I was feeling good about it. As the hours headed toward
evening, I began rounding up the students to begin getting dressed for the banquet. I’d brought my camera
and I wanted to get some pictures of the kids before the banquet began.
Once the dinner started, we settled in our seats and braced for the necessary but grueling functionary events
that lead up to the announcement of the competition winners. Finally the moment arrived. I pushed my chair
away from the table, certain our team would be the first winners announced. Confident we’d win something
and that last year’s winner would win it all. Then the announcement, “and the third place winner is,
Washington D.C.!” I sat there in shock. What does this mean? No way we don’t earn at least third? I was
ready to call for a recount! I’m thinking, “Yvette is going to kill me if we don’t do at least as well as we did last
year!” I looked at my boys. Big smiles on their faces. What the heck did they know? Then the next
announcement, “and the second place winner is, Southern Minnesota!”. I’m smiling as I write this because,
then I knew. I knew it. I knew it. The kids had pulled it off! Now I had a smile on my face as big as
theirs. We had taken Route 66 and circumvented all the obstacles, road hazards, engine trouble, weather and
everything else thrown at us and reached our destination.
Chicago is the largest chapter and accordingly had the largest contingent at the conference. When the
announcement came, “and the 2006 High School Computer Competition winner is… Chicago!”, thunder
erupted in the room. I leapt out of my chair and stood with my hands balled at my sides like superman,
although the supermen were standing around me. Somehow, these jokers had pulled it off, and had known it,
perhaps 24 hours prior. Maybe, they knew it in June when I selected the final members of the team. Maybe
they knew it when they were born… In the end, the top 10 in the standings were:
Chapter Points
Chicago 590
Southern Minnesota 535
Washington D.C. 455
Chattanooga 400
Central Illinois 380
Richmond 355
Austin 320
Hartford 305
Philadelphia 265
Charlotte 260
Well, now our students are big celebrities. Yvette used her connections to get their accomplishment told in
the Chicago Sun-Times. Bruce Montgomery has a show on Chicago Access television where they appeared,
and Lauren Prophet issued pressed releases that notified the city of our victory. The students will be the
special guests of ABN Amro at the BDPA 20th year celebration. They are having dinner with the CIO of Allstate
Insurance along with her officer team. They will be touring Microsoft’s regional headquarters and it seems the
opportunities keep pouring in. As a consequence of being selected to represent the Chicago chapter at the

10. Page 10 Route 66
competition, each student earned $1,500 college scholarship and an Apple iPod which they will receive at the
20th year celebration. As a result of winning the national competition, they won an additional $2,500
scholarship and a HP Laptop computer - Must be nice.
January 6, 2007, we start our journey again. We won’t be on Route 66, but whatever road we take, I know
we’re going to have fun and learn a lot. Alexandre Dumas said, “Nothing succeeds like success”. I don’t mind
helping to prove him right year after year. I don’t know who will win in Washington D.C. next year, but I do
know whoever plans to take our title from us, had better bring a strong team, because they will have to get
past another formidable group of students brought by the Chicago chapter.