The Plymouth Whitemarsh High School Odyssey of the Mind team recently competed in the 2026 World Finals and placed third. The team overcame an initial challenge when one of their boxes wasn’t loaded onto the pallet for shipment, and then FedEx lost it.

Inside the box were costume pieces and the King marionette, a key feature. Overall, it had taken the team more than 50 hours to create these items. The students rallied and created a new puppet and costumes in 11 hours. They did all this while keeping a positive spirit of Odyssey, and having a pizza party with their Polish buddy team from Gdansk.  

Plymouth Whitemarsh competed as the last team in the entire competition and packed the house with all the teams that learned about their “epic quest” to ensure the show must go on! The Colonials competed against 44 other schools from as far away as Hong Kong, Poland, and Switzerland, as well as all across the nation.

You can watch the team’s performance, A Flood of Creativity:  the Colorful Tale of Stanza, and learn more about Odyssey of the Mind below:

Odyssey of the Mind is a creative problem-solving competition.  In September, the students started with a problem that had to include specific elements in an eight-minute performance with a $145 budget:

1. An epic poem
2. A team-created quest
3. A Hero and an additional Sidekick character on the quest
4. An original beast
5. A rescue
6. An epic challenge that is overcome
7. The use of colors to depict different settings

The students create a skit in the most creative way to compete against other teams’ solutions. It is a wonderful program that teaches kids problem-solving, teamwork, drama, art, carpentry, conflict management, time management, and hard work and perseverance.  It starts in elementary school and goes through college.  For more information about the program in Colonial School District, please contact shormell@gmail.com