Niles North seniors Amber Weatherspoon and Ashley Weatherspoon earned national recognition at the 2025 NAACP National ACT-SO competition in July in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Amber earned a silver medal in Computer Science for her project, “Comparing Conventional and Sparse Convolutional Neural Networks in Brain Tumor Classification.” Ashley earned a gold medal in Mathematics for her project, “Statistical Analysis Approach to Investigate Mortality Trends and Underlying Causes in the U.S.” Both students were recognized among more than 600 students from across the country.

Sponsored by the NAACP, ACT-SO is the “Afro-Academic, Cultural, Technological and Scientific Olympics.” The program was established in 1978 to encourage high academic and cultural achievement among African-American high school students. ACT-SO provides mentorship and opportunities in 33 categories across STEM, business, humanities, performing arts, culinary arts, and visual arts. 

For more information about the ACT-SO program, visit www.dupageact-so.org.