Clearwater Middle School dominated the inaugural Bermuda Institute of Ocean Studies Remotely Operated Underwater vehicle Angelfish competition on Sunday.

So dedicated were all of our students that they were even ready to compete in the heavy rains on Saturday.

Unfortunately, the rain won out and the competition was postponed to the next day when most of them attended again.

Our teams had been working since the beginning of the year with our two teacher facilitators/coaches, Mr McLaren Lowe, design and technology teacher, and Ms Katyna Rabain, ICT teacher.

The students had an opportunity to show their creativity in designing a vehicle that would both speed above water and be able to manoeuvre underwater.

Students showed leadership in organising themselves, managing their time to get the machine built and learning to work as a team.

They were competitive and spent a lot of their free time fine-tuning their vehicles after testing to ensure they were speedy yet powerful and adept enough to manoeuvre underwater.

Mr Lowe indicated that the students were keen on the project as soon as they were introduced to it. The M2 boys embraced the opportunity with equal enthusiasm as the M3 students involved.

We were excited to see the final products, observe the students and the decisions they made on the day to ensure that the machines operated at optimum levels on Sunday.

The M2 team won the best overall team award and Phase 4 (speed challenge) award.

Kevin Sunga explained that they tested their vehicle out in salt water first and it floated — but when they went to fresh water, it sank, so they had to go back to redesign it. T’Naje Ray said they were most proud of their performance in the speed challenge as their vehicle took only 16 seconds to finish.

Jacari Renfroe indicated that they felt confident answering the questions of the judges about their design and the buoyancy. They were also happy that they picked up all four of the rings in Phase 3 challenge and almost had the bonus ring as well.

All of them were looking forward to competing again in a similar activity that might be more challenging.

The M3 girls team won Phase 2 (navigation challenge). Toni Ingemann, Keitalia Simons and D’Naje Washington were excited as they had set their sights on beating our male teams. They almost did it. Clearwater’s other teams on the day were as follows:

Team 1: Trey Butterfield, Ezekiel Lewis and Nezhii Spencer.

Team 2: Jamico Smith-Hollis, Kallen Dublin, Najee Simons.

Team 3: Timothy Rogers.

Special Commendation goes to Jamico Smith-Hollis, who showed exceptional leadership through the entire design and creative process, as well as leading his team successfully through the activities on the competition day.

A big thank you also goes to our parent supporters, who came out on Saturday and especially those who returned on Sunday.

The Awards

Overall Best Team: Clearwater Middle School — total score

Phase 1 Winner: Somersfield Academy – interview challenge

Phase 2 Winners: Clearwater Middle School – navigation ring challenge

Phase 3 Winners: Bermuda Home School Association — ring pick up challenge

Phase 4 Winners: Clearwater Middle School – speed challenge

Best Teamwork: Warwick Academy

Best Team Spirit: Sandys Middle School