Update:March 10, 2023

Sapporo Minecraft Contest

Sapporo, UNESCO Creative City of Media Arts, celebrated the 100th anniversary of its city administration on the 1^st August 2022. The city made various efforts to mark this milestone, such as holding the Sapporo Minecraft Contest for the leaders of the future - elementary and junior high school students.

Using Minecraft, a game that is also used as a programming education tool, children were challenged to freely create the future Sapporo. The theme was "The future streets of Sapporo and people’s lives here," taking into consideration various judgement points such as creativity, consideration for the future, technology/programming, love for Sapporo, and quality. 

This was a contest in which elementary and junior high school students, who are to play a leading role over the next 100 years, could create their own world and freely envision the city and the lifestyle of a future Sapporo where they would like to live.

Please watch the following video to hear Mayor Akimoto’s words of encouragement to participants:

Workshop

Before the contest, Microsoft Certified Educational Innovators led a special workshop for beginners and inexperienced programmers. In the workshop, participants learnt how to use programming to produce eggs and blocks, copy buildings and change the colour of blocks, and create automatic doors with Redstone circuits. Using Sapporo Ekimae and Odori Park recreated in Minecraft as a setting, they also imagined what they would like to have in the future Sapporo, creating this together.

Winners

Entries were accepted from 18^th July to 30^th September. Ultimately, a total of 68 entries were submitted - 48 from the individual category and 20 from the group category.

The final judgement and awards ceremony was held on 18^th December (Sun) with eight awards to be presented. On the day of the ceremony, 15 groups were present as finalists.

The Group Grand Prix award was won by "Team Orion," made up of three first-year students (Soshi Kamiya, Ryusei Kasahara, and Haku Teranishi) from Sapporo's Atsubetsu Junior High School, who meticulously designed Sapporo 20 years into the future including even building interiors. Importance was placed on conserving nature and all citizens receiving food and water fairly, and carefully thought-out items such vending machines that offer two meals per person per day and an elevator powered by water were created.

Kentaro Odagiri, a third-year student from Hirosaki Gakuin Seiai Junior High School (Aomori Prefecture) won the Individual Grand Prix award for his work entitled "Takeoff! Future Agriculture." He envisioned Sapporo 30 years into the future with a large-scale urban agricultural factory using solar power from space. Numerous important issues were taken into consideration such as supplying clean energy, Japan's declining birthrate, and extreme weather caused by climate change.

All of the entries firmly impressed the judges and it was wonderful to see the youth of today considering Sapporo's future. More information on the winning creations can be found here (external link; Japanese only).