Students from La Vista Middle School, Liberty Middle School, and Papillion Middle School brought home impressive honors at the Society of American Military Engineers' Student Mentoring Program Competition, capping off six months of work developing engineering solutions to real-world community problems. The results underscored the depth of talent and preparation across all three PLCS middle school teams.

The standout performance of the day came from LVMS #1's Ebikes team, which earned the Post President's Award of Honor — the competition's top recognition — and made history as the only team in the entire competition to receive gold ratings in both Innovation and Applied Sciences. Papillion Middle School earned the Award of Distinction for second place, while LVMS #2 also claimed the Award of Distinction with a fifth-place finish.

The SAME Student Mentoring Program challenges students to approach real community challenges through the lens of engineering and design, working with professional mentors to develop and refine their solutions over the course of the school year. For PLCS middle schoolers, the program offers a meaningful bridge between classroom STEM instruction and authentic, project-based problem-solving that mirrors the work of professional engineers.

The achievements of all three teams reflect the strong STEM culture that runs across the Papillion La Vista Community Schools system. From the initial stages of research and ideation through the pressure of competition day, these students demonstrated exactly the kind of learning, collaboration, and creative thinking the district works to foster — and their results speak for themselves. #PLCSMixtape