Local teams going to national SeaPerch competition

Three teams that competed in the 2015 USI Regional SeaPerch Challenge, held April 25 at the Mount Vernon Junior High School Natatorium, will advance to the National SeaPerch Challenge May 29-30 at Dartmouth University.

Teams advancing to the national competition are the Hoosiers by Sea and Hoosiers by Land from St. John the Baptist Middle School and the Tiger Sharks from Reitz Memorial High School. Twenty-nine middle school teams and five high school teams competed locally at the region level.

This was the fifth year that the event has been hosted by the University of Southern Indiana's Southwest Indiana STEM (SwISTEM) Resource Center in partnership with the Naval Surface Warfare Center, Crane Division STEM Team and Indiana SeaPerch. 

"Each year, organizers are immensely and increasingly impressed with the local talent and dedication that participating students exhibit at this event," said Allison Grabert, director of the SwISTEM Resource Center. "Here in southwest Indiana, we have a strong pocket of STEM-minded youth who are constantly encouraging us that we need to look no further than our own back yards to find the future of STEM innovation."

A qualifying event also was held at North Daviess Junior-Senior High School on March 7.