North Carolina Region History
Future Cities is a cross-curricular, project-based engineering education program that challenges middle-school students to imagine, design, and build cities of the future. Participants learn about the career of engineering, use the engineering design process to address civic and social issues, and become change-makers in their own communities. It is a unique STEM program in that it focuses on the sustainability of the Earth’s resources. Being cross-curricular, there are aspects of science, math, research, writing, communication, and 21 st Century skills embedded within the program. It is closely aligned with many educational standards in the North Carolina curriculum.
The Future Cities Competition, under the DiscoverE organization umbrella, first began in 1993. The first competition in North Carolina, formed in partnership with the Professional Engineers of NC organization, was held in January 2002 at the NC Museum of History in Raleigh. As the number of participating schools began to grow, the competition moved in 2007 to NC State University.
A red-letter day for the North Carolina region happened when the 2012 winner from NC placed first at the National Competition in Washington, DC, and got to meet the President in the Oval Office.
During the COVID outbreak, the competition in NC took a break for 1 year. Competition resumed virtually in the 2021-22 school year with 14 schools/23 teams participating. Since then, the program in North Carolina, again an “in-person” event, has grown exponentially:
- 2021-22 14 schools/23 teams
- 2022-23 19 schools/29 teams
- 2023-24 26 schools/42 teams (over 1000 people attended competition day)
- 2024-25 39 schools/teams
- 2025-26 Two snow day cancellations, 38 schools submitted videos for a virtual competition
In 2022, the NC Future Cities program became a part of Scholastic’s NCASA Challenge Cup.
In the 2024-25 school year, a Future Cities program for high school students began, with 5 teams from North Carolina participating.
Much of the growth in the NC region is due to a grant received from the NC Legislature which helped us to reach out to bring this opportunity to learn about engineering careers to more schools in our state. This grant has enabled our region to award stipends to teachers/coaches, provide travel expenses for schools to come to the regional competition in January, as well as provide monetary prizes for teams. As a result of this grant, the participation of Title 1 schools has doubled.
Are you interested in learning more? Contact Mary Beth Liles: fc.nc.outreach@gmail.com.
2026-2027 Future City Competition
This year’s theme: Fire Resilient Future
Overview: Around the world, fires that once burned mostly in forests or grasslands are now reaching suburbs and cities.
This often happens where neighborhoods and natural areas meet, in a place called the Wildland-Urban
Interface (WUI). The WUI is expanding as people build more homes, roads, and power lines in areas that were
previously undeveloped. In the United States, more than 60,000 communities are located in or near the WUI,
and this area is growing by about 2 million acres each year. At the same time, the impacts of climate change
are influencing fire seasons by making some places warmer, drier, and windier for longer parts of the year.
These changes mean that fires can behave differently than they did in the past. Many of today’s most
damaging fires to people and structures are wildfires that spread from the Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI)
into cities and towns. Once flames or flying embers reach a neighborhood, homes and buildings can
sometimes ignite from one another like dominos, allowing fire to move quickly through communities instead
of staying only in natural areas. This shows that the challenge is not just fire itself, but how and where cities
are designed and built.
The good news is that cities are learning how to prepare and respond. In the past, fire management focused
mostly on putting fires out or removing vegetation. Today, communities are exploring smarter, more balanced
approaches that allow people and nature to live safely together. Engineers, architects, fire marshals, and city
planners are working to reduce human-caused fires, designing fire-resistant buildings, creating defensible
green spaces, and developing early-warning technologies that reduce risk and protect communities. The cities
of the future can be places that grow wisely, adapt to change, and thrive, even in a fire-adapted world.
The students’ challenge: Design a resilient future city that can prevent, protect, and recover from urban wildfires.
2025-26 Teacher Kickoff Meeting
2025-26 Essay Training
Competition Day 2026
Truly January 2026 was a year for the history books for the NC Future City Competition, as the competition was cancelled not once, but two weekends in a row due to weather. Our teams were resilient, and even though schools were not in session most of the two weeks prior to competition day, most teams were able to submit a video presentation with their skit, answers to questions, and their spotlight on specialty awards. Many thanks to the volunteers and judges who were able to come to McKimmon Center the Friday before the second snow to help sort and pack t-shirts and swag, as well as judge the video submissions.
Below is the virtual award ceremony for Competition Day 2026.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1n10aacKninm-s8dBlghNE21shRHE1jE1/view?usp=sharing
Congratulations to the top team, KahayaTani from The Brawley School, who represented our region well at the national competition. They won a specialty award for Best Water Management System.
Below is their video presentation.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/19PDAI6XQZedfAzAXbWLYYqYeMKF5jaOI/view?usp=sharing
Top 5 Teams:
- 1st – The Brawley School (Mooresville, NC)
- 2nd – Morganton Day School (Morganton, NC)
- 3rd – Reedy Creek Middle School (Cary, NC)
- 4th – STEM Skool (Charlotte, NC)
- 5th – Elysium School of Innovation (Mooresville, NC)
Region Resources
Here is a video from the 2023-24 competition:
Sponsors
There are many different ways to sponsor the Future Cities program. Engineering professionals can volunteer as mentors or judges to support our students. If you are interested register at this link:
Companies can also sponsor the competition financially. Thank you to the sponsors for the 2025-26 competition! If your company would like to become a sponsor, please see our sponsorship letter below.
If you would like to be a future sponsor for this competition, here is the Fundraising Request Letter, or complete the Future City Sponsorship Form.
Contact Us
Regional Coordinator – Mary Beth Liles
Email: FC.NC.Outreach@gmail.com
Logistics Coordinator – Vanessa LaClair
Email: FC.NC.Logistics@gmail.com