WaterWise wins Rep. Julie Fedorchak’s 2025 Congressional App Challenge in North Dakota’s At-Large District
Rep. Julie Fedorchak has named Che Yu of Red River High School as the winner of the 2025 Congressional App Challenge in North Dakota’s At-Large District. Their app WaterWise predicts soil moisture for a 7-day period into the future, and alerts farmers to incoming moisture threats.
When asked what inspired the creation of WaterWise, Che Yu said, “I am passionate about computer science and machine learning for practical applications. North Dakota is an agriculture-heavy state, and water is crucial for farming. However, after doing some research, I discovered that there were no free tools that could predict soil moisture for the purpose of assisting intelligent irrigation decisions. Such a tool would improve water resource conservation and improve crop yield, which would highly benefit the community.”
The 2025 Congressional App Challenge marked another record-setting year for the program. A total of 394 Members of the U.S. House of Representatives hosted App Challenges in their congressional districts, the highest level of participation in the program’s history. More than 13,800 students from across the country participated, submitting over 4,600 original apps focused on real-world challenges ranging from health and accessibility to education, sustainability, and civic engagement.
The Congressional App Challenge is an official initiative of the U.S. House of Representatives that encourages middle school and high school students to learn to code, explore computer science, and build practical technology solutions for their communities. Each participating Member of Congress selects a winning app from their district, and winning teams are invited to showcase their projects to Members of Congress, staff, and industry leaders at the annual #HouseOfCode celebration on Capitol Hill.
The Challenge is proudly bipartisan and reflects a shared commitment to expanding access to STEM education and preparing the next generation of American innovators for the future workforce. The program is a public-private partnership made possible through funding from the Broadcom Foundation, AWS, Infosys Foundation USA, theCoderSchool, Apple, and others.
The 2026 Congressional App Challenge will launch in May, and eligible students can pre-register for the competition now.