Students Engineer 'Farm to Table' Cities
DiscoverE has announced the winners of its 2026 Future City global STEM competition for middle and high school students. This year's challenge was to design a 'Farm to Table' city focused on eliminating food waste. The competition celebrates innovative engineering and problem-solving among young students.
- The Future City Competition, which began in 1992, involves teams of 6th, 7th, and 8th-grade students, and recently expanded to include high schoolers. - The 2026 "Farm to Table" theme required students to design cities applying circular economy principles to combat food waste; globally, about 40% of all food produced is wasted, accounting for 8% of greenhouse gas emissions. - To compete, teams must submit several deliverables: a 1,500-word city essay, a scale model built from recycled materials, a project plan, and a live presentation to a panel of judges. - Previous competition themes have challenged students to find solutions for stormwater management, design a city on the moon, and create a fully electric city. - Cinnaminson Middle School, a regional winner in Philadelphia, designed a city called "Applewood" that uses hydroponics and AI to grow produce and converts agricultural waste into biofuel. - The competition is a global event, with over 70,000 students participating from more than 1,800 teams across the United States, Canada, China, Egypt, and Nigeria. - Regional winners advance to the finals held in Washington, D.C., where the top prize for the middle school competition is a trip to U.S. Space Camp and $7,500 for the winning team's STEM program.
