South Range Middle School competes in Genius project.

CANFIELD — Thirty students from South Range Middle School are spending an hour a week to solve a problem of global proportion.

“This is your hands-on, this is real-life application,” said Brock Miller, an eighth-grade math teacher at South Range. “It gives kids an opportunity to get away from the typical core classes.”

This is the Northeast Ohio Genius Project.

South Range is joining schools from Columbiana, Portage, Stark, Summit and Tuscarawas counties as the first Genius Project competitor from Mahoning County. The project incorporates elements of art, science, math and financial literacy, and gives students a problem to solve.

“It’s a great learning activity that helps us enhance our minds,” said Jacob Richardson, seventh-grader and self-proclaimed “cool guy.”

The clock is running. The students’ goal is to design a plane capable of achieving the same air speed as a Cessna Citation X – that’s 528 knots.

For the complete story, read Tuesday's Vindicator and Vindy.com