Fill Food Banks wins Rep. Katie Porter’s 2023 Congressional App Challenge in California’s 47th District
Rep. Porter has named Cooper McCloskey, a 10th grader at Corona Del Mar High School, as the winner of the 2023 Congressional App Challenge in California’s 47th District.
When asked what inspired the creation of Fill Food Banks, the student said, “During Covid-19 food banks shut down for health reasons. The government made sure to provide support for people who required food banks’ service. However, when the pandemic ended, so did these government programs, and the food banks did not come back in the same capacity as they had before. It is necessary that we support these food banks. I thought it would be good to try to donate to these food banks. However, when I was looking into donating healthy foods, it was impossible to find the necessary information and would’ve taken many hours just to find a food bank that would accept the food I wanted to donate. This was a problem I knew I could solve so I created this app.”
This year’s Challenge saw an unprecedented level of participation, with 374 Members of the House of Representatives hosting competitions, surpassing the previous record of 340. A remarkable 11,334 students from across the United States competed in this year’s Challenge, marking an impressive increase of nearly 1,000 participants compared to the previous record set in 2019. The enthusiasm and creativity these students display is a testament to the growing interest in technology and signal a bright future for American innovation. The surge of ingenuity continued with a whopping 3,645 original applications flooding in, nearly a thousand more than the previous year’s high. This remarkable growth showcases the exceptional talent and innovation within our nation’s youth.
The Congressional App Challenge is an official initiative of the U.S. House of Representatives, where Members of Congress host contests in their districts for middle school and high school students, encouraging them to learn to code and inspiring them to pursue careers in computer science. This resounding show of bipartisan support emphasizes the critical importance of STEM education in today’s rapidly evolving world. Each participating Member of Congress selects a winning app from their district, and each winning team is invited to showcase their winning app to Congress during our annual #HouseOfCode festival. The program is a public-private partnership made possible through funding from Omidyar Network, AWS, Rise, theCoderSchool, Apple, and others.
The 2024 Congressional App Challenge will launch in May of 2024, and eligible students can pre-register for the competition now.