Future Problem Solvers Club Wins International Competition
Vice president, Ajay Bhatia, along with Co-President, Kiley Espinera, discusses future plans with the FPS club. They talk about the 12 hour run they will be hosting and who wants to volunteer. The club meets every Tuesday in room H205.
November 12, 2018
The Future Problem Solvers (FPS) Club at SJHHS won grand champion at an international competition for their work with mental health in Orange County, as well as placed in the top ten for their writing.
“FPS is an international organization where students come together and solve problems. Our club solves problems for the community, and for the competition portion we are given a problem or a futuristic issue and we have to come up with a practical solution,” said co-president, Elle Peloso.
The community based portion of the club focuses on creating solutions and awareness for problems concerning mental health and suicide specifically. They started a project called “Project SOS” and work with both teens and adults to help educate youth on mental health.
I’ve also been able to sympathize with people who have mental health disorders because I’ve learned a lot more about it — Cooper Murr
“We’re trying to create a new generation of youth and… we hope to help people be more creative and think things through,” said vice president Ella Friess.
“We try to come up with solutions to [problems] by making educational presentations and present them at local middle and high schools to raise awareness about mental health and suicide,” said Peloso.
These educational presentations led to the club attending the Future Problem Solvers International Conference in June 2018. They traveled to Wisconsin and Friess said “there were people from all around America and all around the world coming together and competing in the different categories that FPS has, which is mostly futuristic problem solving.”
The club did very well and won several awards. They placed tenth, internationally, for the booklet portion of the competition and as for the community based part of the competition, the club won overall grand champion at the conference.
“Our plans for the future are to get more people and more freshman into the FPS club… and also to further the SOS project for mental health,” said Cooper Murr.
Murr said, “I think it’s had a personal impact on me because I’ve been able to develop my social skills with public speaking and I’ve also been able to sympathize with people who have mental health disorders because I’ve learned a lot more about it.”
The club also plans on having a 4 hour run at SJHHS to raise awareness about mental health and to raise money to go towards Mission Hospital. This event will be taking place in February 2019.
