Destination Imagination is taking over the world! Save us from these scary, creative, and innovative minds! Just kidding – but really…Bob Jones’ DI teams are going to dominate at the #GlobalFinals2015. This is history in the making.

Speaking of history, DI wasn’t always called DI. It used to be called the OM Association, Inc. before 1999. According to the DI website, their “non-profit has impacted more than one million participants.”

Within the one million participants, there are about “200,000 youth [who] make friends and learn the creative process through [the DI] programs every year, and 38,000 volunteers support [them]!” At Bob Jones, there are two teams that qualified for Global Finals.

Throughout this school year, there was a team that won first place for its challenge. Their challenge was called “Making Waves.” The team, named “We Are the Flow of Traffic,” truly stepped it up when “[they] created a machine that made two separate sounds and [they also] created a play that was centered around the machine,” according to junior Will Richerson, who is currently on the “We Are the Flow of Traffic” team here at Bob Jones.

The opportunity to participate in Global Finals isn’t as simple to receive as one might initially think. It’s expensive to pay for all the rides, food, and a place to stay. Bob Jones’ Destination Imagination teams held a series of fundraisers. These included a rummage sale, a “DI Day” at Zen Beri, car washes, and, of course, selling their infamous shaved ice throughout the year during lunchtime and fall football games!

Once the team raised enough money, the time would come to take the three-hour car ride to Knoxville, TN. From there, they’ll find challenges all around the campus of the University of Tennessee to complete. For more information on Global Finals 2015, visit the welcome page.You can watch the Global Finals live from your device or computer.

Next year, we can all show our love and appreciation for our DI teams by buying some shaved ice during a football game or purchasing an item at their annual rummage sale. Even though you may not have contributed this year, they will still be there to sell shaved ice next year. There will always be some kind of fundraiser going on for DI. If you follow @RobinDauma on twitter, you can receive updates about the various fundraisers throughout the school year.

And why wouldn’t we help? There are three teams out there right now representing Bob Jones, and we should be proud of them. Why, you ask? Last year, “DIstracted” beat out eighty-three other teams and won first place in the world! If that doesn’t scream “world domination,” then I don’t know what does.