Not many elementary and junior high students spend their free time talking about child labor. But for 14 students, child labor issues will be their main topic of conversation this week.

Students from Park Elementary and Dean Morgan Junior High qualified for the Future Problem Solvers International Conference, held at Michigan State University. More than 250,000 students participate in the activity throughout the year.

The students left Wednesday for the conference, which continues until Sunday.

The conference challenges students to find solutions to problems such as child labor or debt in developing countries by looking to the future.

Students use a five-step process that encourages in-depth critical thinking, and present their final solutions after two hours of work.

"It teaches you a different way to think about solving a problem," said Ben Shumate, a fifth-grader in Park Elementary's Gifted and Talented program. "Since it's in the future, you can come up with stuff that's not even possible today. It expands how to think about a problem."

Ben and his older sister Alaina both qualified for nationals. Alaina, a seventh-grader, said this will be her third year attending the national conference.

"It's really cool," she said. "There's kids from all over the world - Singapore, Australia."

Alaina's teammate, Bethany Simonson, said being in the Future Problem Solvers group has challenged her mind.

"It's different that anything else you do in school," she said. "It's thought provoking."

Park teacher Noreen Stutheit has coached the team for five years, though she said she was wary about starting the group.

Future Problem Solvers is, "really hard and it's really complex," Stutheit said.

Stutheit said she heard past Problem Solvers talk about how the program honed their critical thinking, which in some cases gave them an edge when applying for jobs. Stutheit started the program in hopes her students would have the same opportunity.

"I wanted to give them that chance," Stutheit said. "That was really powerful to me."

Reach education reporter Jasa Santos at (307) 266-0593 or at Jasa.Santos@trib.com