ONTARIO — Austin Chartier could barely see past the front of his boat. The homemade cardboard vessel bowed in the middle, sending the edges of the bow and the stern above his head.
Chartier, a seventh grader at Ontario Middle School, didn’t let it stop him. Armed with a plastic oar, he rowed tirelessly across the swimming pool.
“It was really difficult because the boat just kept shifting side to side, so I had to use the paddle to push it off the edge a bit,” Chartier said. “It’s really hard to steer.”
Close to 40 middle school teams competed in the Bruce Weirich Cardboard Boat Regatta Friday morning. Each team had three rowers who traveled one length of the pool, relay-style.
“When I stepped in, it just completely folded,” said Chartier, the first member of his team to sail. “A little pocket came out and water started rushing in.”
Sailors hailed from Ontario Middle School, Clear Fork Middle School, Galion Middle School and Shiloh Middle School. Teams designed and constructed their vessels out of cardboard, glue and duct tape in the weeks prior to the event.
Boats were disqualified if they flipped or fell apart in the water. While The Silver Bullet certainly struggled, it managed to stay afloat for the entire race.
Chartier’s classmates cheered his name from the sidelines. Their enthusiasm increased as he neared the finish line.
“It really encouraged me to keep going,” he said.
Regatta hones engineering, teamwork skills
Clear Fork Middle School teacher Ed Kossick brought four teams to the regatta. The students are all part of a STEM class and wore t-shirts with “Clear Fork Yacht Club” printed on the front.
Kossick, who teaches science, engineering, technology and math (STEM), said his students were skeptical at first that a cardboard boat could actually sail.
“We did calculations on things like buoyant forces. They came up with all these cross supports and all this engineering just to make it so that doesn’t flop like a pancake,” he said.
Members of the Clear Fork Yacht Club made miniature models of their boats with paper and masking tape, then finalized the designs in a computer assisted design (CAD) software before building the final product.
“I picked some engineers. They picked their crews and we built these over maybe four weeks,” Kossick said.
It was the first year the Colts competed, but Kossick said it won’t be the last. Organizers said Shelby Middle School is set to join next year.
Bruce Weirich, whom the regatta is named for, presented the awards. Weirich taught industrial tech at Ontario High School for 35 years. He currently teaches at Galion High School.
Weirich said students do learn engineering concepts from participating in the regatta, but they also gain something even more valuable.
“The biggest thing I like about this is when you build the boat, it’s teamwork,” said Weirich, a 48th year educator. “It’s usually got two or three people that build it.
“So you’re working as a team, you’re overcoming problems with other people.”
Another important element of the regatta is simply that it’s fun.
“Education is tough with all the testing and everything these kids have to do. They have to meet certain standards,” Weirich said. “Let them have fun.”
