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Florence High School students excel in dream home contest

Florence High School students from left, Noah Schuirmann, Eric DeCremer and Bradley Kindness place in the top 10 in the National LEED Dream Home contest.

FLORENCE, Wis. –Three students from Tom Beck’s Florence High School CAD program placed in the top ten from all entries nationwide in the annual National LEED Dream Home contest, sponsored by Arizona-based STEM curriculum developer, the CAD Academy.

Junior Noah Schuirmann took second place, junior Bradley Kindness took third place and senior Eric DeCremer had a top 10 finish.

“This experience taught me how to use my time wisely, make connections and not settle on a ‘good enough’ design while working on a big project,” Schuirmann said.

“One of the main things that I learned is that the process of designing a house is daunting and requires a lot of work,” DeCremer his experience.

“I learned all about how to reuse different materials so you can minimize the cost of the project overall,” Kindness said. “Also, I learned about how to use solar panels and wind turbines to maximize the energy intake for the house.”

The contest is a way to give students an opportunity to get hands-on experience with BIM software, namely ARCHICAD. As a secondary and post-secondary engineering and architectural program, the CAD Academy designed its curriculum to inspire a new generation of engineers and architects. Their annual contest requires participants to comply with LEED requirements while designing their project in ARCHICAD, software. 

“We are so proud of all of the students who participated in our contest this year,” said Stephanie Kvamme, CAD Academy President. “They represent only the very best — which is clearly illustrated by one of our judges mistakenly thinking the entries had been crafted by university students.” 

“Both Schuirmann and Kindness were rewarded for their work with loaded 17-inch Dell laptop computers.” Kvamme said. “All three students did a fantastic job. They obviously come from a very strong program. There was just a point between first and second. Congratulation on well-deserved wins.”

Beck said that he was “very proud of the boys and was happy to see their hard work recognized and rewarded. To have three students from our small school finish in the top ten from thousands of entries nationwide is quite an achievement.”

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