Schools
Video: AP Physics students row their boats across Richards pool
Students design, build, row their boats constructed of cardboard, duct tape
Limited to duct tape and cardboard, students enrolled in Advanced Placement Physics at Richards High School recently designed and constructed boats. And then plunged them into the pool to see how well they’d engineered them.
“Students had calculated their expected depth ahead of time using their weights and the area of their boat’s bottoms. The idea was to find the buoyant force necessary to float the boat by finding the volume of water displaced,” teacher Stan Natonek said.
Below, the video better captures the event, which involved students rowing their boats across the pool. They earned bonus points for creative decor.
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“While building their boats the students were most concerned with waterproofing. We had discussed in class the ideas of buoyancy and displacement so they had an idea of how high the walls of their boats should have been,” Natonek said.
