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Two FPS teams from Birmingham Groves are ready to take on the world.

DEBRA B. DARVICK
Special to the Jewish News

IV

hat has 16 legs, eight brains,
starts with a fuzzy and ends
with a pair of trophies and
Michigan high school history?
The answer is two Future Problem
Solving teams from Birmingham Groves High
School.
In March, eight seniors, including Josh
Zwickl of Southfield, Caryn Roman of
Franklin, Michael Goldberg of Bloomfield
Hills and Shayna Hansen of West Bloomfield,
took the top two places at the state FPS com-
petition in Ann Arbor. It was the first time a
Michigan high school had two teams place
first and second and the first time that a team

Preparing
their "best
solution "pre-
sentation are
Shayna
Hansen, Josh
Zwickl, Kelly
Cook and
Pamela
Thomas.

AIN

6/2
i 2000

100

— Michael, Caryn, Bethany Domzal and
Elizabeth Lin — placed first two years run-
ning.
Both Groves teams will compete at the
international competition at the University of
Georgia June 8-11.
The Future Problem Solving Program chal-
lenges participants, through a minutely
detailed set of processes, to solve problems.
Competitors are given a "fuzzy," a hypotheti-
cal but realistic situation that might occur in
the future. They have two hours to brain-
storm 20 possible problems inherent to the
scenario and 20 solutions, which must be
ranked strongest to weakest.
A lighter component of the competition

has teams create a short skit based on one of
their 20 problems and solutions.
Josh Zwickl, with teammates Shayna
Hansen, Pamela Thomas and Kelly Cook,
placed second in Ann Arbor in problem solv-
ing and first in the skit. Josh has been
involved in FPS since ninth grade. "Our
group gets along real well," he says.
"Freshman year we were kind of uptight, but
over the years we've learned to get along, to
focus on our strengths. We never go in trying
to win, per se. We just say to ourselves, 'It's
another two hours. We'll let our minds open
up and flow together.' We know we'll all live
up to each other's expectations and just go
from there."
Going-from-there-strategies take many
forms. Josh and Shayna's team spends the first
10 minutes brainstorming together and jot-
ting down potential problems. The next 20
minutes are spent framing the problems in
correct FPS format.
Michael Goldberg, Caryn Roman and
their teammates use a divide-and-conquer
approach. "Karen and Elizabeth are the brain-
stormers," Michael says. "They are the imag-
iners for creating.the problems that we are to
write about.
"Bethany and I get started doing the writ-
ing. We all write in the end, but it has to do
with how we create [the initial set of prob-
lems]. We have an even flow going."
In Ann Arbor, the fuzzy focused on a day
in the life of a family whose child did not
attend school but was educated by a comput-
er "PAL" who taught him academics, told
him when to exercise, when to eat, etc. The
computer was friend, teacher, coach; in this
globally hooked up world, the child had no
other-interaction with anyone else.
On the day in question, the child's parents
were in a distant city checking out system
upgrades. "What are the problems you see
with the way they lead their lives?" the fuzzy
asked.
Josh's team's winning skit presented a fami-
ly that was no longer PAL-dependent. Their
mold-breaking family played badminton and
had a cheerleading son and a dancer daughter.
(Props required to be used in the skit includ-

ed a badminton birdie and a pompon.)
Michael Goldberg's team brainstromed
alternative schools to get around the isolation
that PAL learning generated.
Caryn Roman has been involved in FPS
since fifth grade. "I love it," she says, "It's a
totally different activity than anything else I
do. It involves random problem solving and
thinking about things you never think about.
Best of all, we have a good time together."
After so many years of working with
fuzzies, Roman says that her mind has been
"trained to look at a situation from an out-
side perspective and see what outcomes
there could be. When our youth group
would talk about programs, I would find
myself foreseeing how certain things would
run and how people would respond. The
[FPS] mentality has been ingrained; it
applies to other things I do."
Shayna Hansen enjoys the group energy
that comes from being sequestered in a
room for two hours, under the gun to come
up with the required number of problems
and solutions. "There are no bad ideas," she
says. "All ideas are applicable and everyone
is willing to compromise. Ideas spawn other
ideas; someone can mention a situation in
relation to the fuzzy and that spurs other
ideas in the group. We never say no to any
idea.
Phyllis Jarvis, a Birmingham Berkshire
Middle School reading specialist and coordi-
nator of Berkshire's enrichment programs,
will accompany the Groves eight to Georgia.
"These kids are bright, articulate," she says.
"They are just phenomenal. They are good
friends and that lends to good spirit across
the teams. There couldn't be eight better kids
representing Groves."
Before they leave for college — Josh to
Washington University, Michael to Indiana
University, Caryn to Boston College and
Shayna to Kalamazoo College — the Groves
eight will match wits against teams from
Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand, and
Chile. Win or lose the seniors have kept a
healthy perspective.
"The entire process is enjoyable," Michael
Goldberg says. "Winning is just the frosting." ❑

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