This past month, sixty primary and middle school educators from the Bermuda Union of Teachers came to BIOS to participate in a professional development workshop focused on marine robotics.  The workshop involved PVC pipes, car batteries, foam noodles, propellers, and a race against time as participants were challenged to build their own Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs) for launch into the Sargasso Sea. Successful ROVs are neutrally buoyant and can be maneuvered through the water to complete tasks, mimicking the professional classes of underwater robotics used around the world to collect data for science and industry.

What do golden rafts of seaweed, great ocean currents, and ghost stories have in common?  They all play a part in the history and ecology of the Sargasso Sea, the focus of the 2012 Explorer program at BIOS that introduced 1300 primary students to hands-on marine biology, chemistry, and physics. With the recent publication of an “Expedition Sargasso” lesson plan by Kaitlin Baird, Assistant Director of Science Education Programs at BIOS, many more students will be able to discover the unique communities that thrive in Sargassum seaweed and explore the interconnectedness of ocean ecosystems.

The BIOS education team proudly accepted the TechAwards14 “Most Innovative Youth Project” for Ocean Academy’s HSBC Explorer program. The team sincerely thanks the Ministry of Education and Economic Development, and the sponsors of Ocean Academy.

Last month, twenty-one teams from nine schools—including a new team from Impact Mentoring Academy—met at the National Sports Centre for the 2019 Marine Advanced Technology in Education (MATE) Bermuda Regional Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) Challenge.

The sixgill shark approached the camera deployed from a boat floating five miles offshore Cooper’s Island in Bermuda, then did what sharks often do: tried to eat it.

Since 2015, the Mid-Atlantic Robotics IN Education (MARINE) program has been a core component of BIOS’s Ocean Academy, which offers a suite of hands-on education and research opportunities for students and teachers in Bermuda. BIOS is pleased to announce that MARINE has a new lead sponsor in RenaissanceRe, which has generously funded the program for the next two years, supporting the program’s goals of engaging participants in scientific concepts and enhancing science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education in the classroom.

A Bermuda-tested camera that is so small and lightweight that it can rest on top of a credit card, yet is robust enough to withstand pressure from tons of ocean water while capturing video and photos at depths up to 18,044 feet (5,500 meters), has made the cover of the monthly marine sciences journal Deep Sea Oceanography, Part I.

On May 28, 2020, a team of ocean educators from BIOS, the Bermuda Zoological Society (BZS), and the Bermuda Underwater Exploration Institute (BUEI) hosted the first episode of a virtual educational series called Ocean Diaries. The collaborative effort emerged in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced the cancellation of the annual BIOS Mid-Atlantic Robotics in Education (MARINE) robotics challenge, as well as other educational activities on the island.