Speyside High create the app that unfit gamers need

A TEAM OF PUPILS from Speyside High School are heading to London this weekend to show off their entry in the national ‘Apps for Good’ competition.

Apps for Good is a charity that each year hosts a contest that challenges secondary school pupils to design and develop their own Smartphone app.

The challenge is that their creation should be capable of “doing some good in the community” – during the course of the competition students need to quickly learn product developments skills, computational thinking, teamwork and ultimately entrepreneurial and marketing skills.

Throughout the UK a total of 25,000 students have been working on their apps – including in the competition this year the Speyside High team of Jack Taylor (S6), Kyle Jones, Josh Oakman and Connor Pegg (S5) and Freya Daggert (S2), have produced ‘Keep Fit Determination’.

Marc McWhirter, the principal teacher of computing at the Aberlour school, said: “Their app targets computer gamers and seeks to inspire and motivate them to be more active – it is in effect an ‘exercise app for gamers’.”

Last year another team from the school drew great acclaim for their app ‘Torr’ which was a finalist in the ‘People’s Choice’ group of the awards. For their bid this year the team have produced a video presentation explaining the thinking behind their app (below).