FOR the fourth straight year, Marianas High School has won the annual NMI Congressional App Challenge.
Marianas High School students Jie Du, Carson Lin, James Lin and Jun Du.
Contributed photo
This year’s winners from MHS are Justin Du, Jie Du, Carson Lin and James Lin who developed a customer relationship management app to help businesses on Saipan flourish even in the time of pandemic. They are all in 10th grade except for James Lin who is a ninth grader.
In an email interview, Jun Du and Carson Li said they spent more than three months to develop their app, which is called SRC.
“Our app is for customer relationship management,” Jun Du said.
“It can help small businesses keep track of customers and payments even if the pandemic is still going on,” Carson Lin added.
When he found out about the Congressional App Challenge, he said he asked his brother James, Jun Du and Jie Du to help him develop an app.
It was their first time to participate in the annual app competition.
“We were surprised to hear that we won,” Jun Du said.
For their victory, they will receive national recognition and their work will be displayed at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. They will also receive invitations to the House of Code reception, which will be held virtually next spring.
In a statement issued by U.S. Congressman Gregorio Kilili Camacho Sablan’s office, placing second in this year’s app challenge were MHS students Jaehoon Son and Dip Roy with their app, “Kallo.”
Kallo is a Chrome browser extension that restricts and reports a student’s activities during a test or exam.
Mount Carmel School students Mikee Mame Mendoza and Maria Ayuyu placed third with their app “EcoFriend,” which allows individuals to keep track of their ecological footprints and the steps they take to improve the environment.
“This year’s app submissions were some of the most creative and thoughtful concepts for apps that I have seen,” Congressman Kilili said. “All of our participants displayed perseverance in their use of code and turned their innovative ideas into functional apps.”
The previous winners of the annual competition were MHS students Daniel Villarmero and Chenoa Bunts-Anderson in 2017; MHS students Ian Cataluna, Gaeun Yang, Celina Wu and Mimi Sukano in 2018; and MHS students Julia Malate, Nan Xie and Grace Zhang in 2019.
