Today I’m in Cincinnati at the Midwest Regional Mock Competition for HSCC, supporting our high school student team, and helping to serve as one of the judges during the competition. 
Regional competitions are a great way for our students to begin to get a feel for what they can expect in the actual national competition in August.
Aside from a slightly abbreviated time schedule and fewer teams to compete against, the regional mock competition offers a pretty accurate representation of the real thing. The Cincinnati chapter of BDPA put a
lot of work into bringing this together, with special thanks going to Cincinnati State Technical and Community College for providing their facilities. 
Among the teams represented at this year’s Midwest regionals are Columbus, Cincinnati, Detroit, and even Los Angeles (the West Coast did not have a regional event this year, so LA is participating virtually in our competition this year via Skype).
I’m always amazed at the stamina and endurance of our young students, as they sit through an entire day of testing and coding. The first couple of hours involves team quizzes and oral competitions, and a written portion as well. But the bulk of their day is spent in one room, huddled around a single computer, working together for several hours to solve a web development problem that they’ve seen for the first time that day. I know some adults that probably wouldn’t be able to hang in there for something like this. :)
Good job, HSCC – see you in Chicago in August!
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Thanks for taking your time as a volunteer to work with the young people from Columbus OH. I enjoyed meeting them at the regional HSCC championship. I also appreciate you for writing your thoughts on the event on this blog ... and the interviews that you conducted that can now be found on YouTube.
Please consider changing the 'title' of your YouTube videoclip so that it is more likely to be found if someone does a search for it.
peace, Wayne