Pacific Horizons School NaviTechers club — “never gives up, never surrenders”

Pago Pago, AMERICAN SAMOA — After the American Samoa Regional MATE ROV (underwater remote operated vehicle) competition was canceled, the Pacific Horizons School NaviTechers club wasn’t willing to lose the opportunity to design and build their 4th generation robot, so they’ve been working Saturdays, Sundays, and school holidays to complete their newest engineering designs.

The MATE ROV competition was introduced to American Samoa in 2019 by NOAA and the Tauese Sunia Ocean center.

The Stockbridge Michigan High School, who in spite of being an even smaller community than American Samoa, and had won first place overall in the global MATE competition earlier, graciously donated their team’s time and materials to introduce the MATE ROV competition to our local high schools and ASCC.

Most of Pacific Horizons students in the (after school) ROV club have ‘come up through the ranks’, participating in the Army Educational Outreach Program (AEOP) Junior Solar Sprints (PHS placed seventh in the US!), and have also participated in PHS’ formal Robotics program, where they’ve learned digital and analog circuit design, building and programming a variety of sensors, such as ultra sound ranging, IR (infrared) remote control, temperature, visual color sensors, and magnetometer/ accelerometers. 

On the engineering side of robotics, they’ve also learned how to use CAD (3-D printer) and CAM (computer assisted design/ manufacturing) to design and build parts for their robots so they can teach them how to play a form of soccer. The more advanced students are also working with V2V (vehicle to vehicle communication), integrating sensors and radio communications to have a leg up on designing autonomous car navigation systems when they get to university.

The PHS ROV program has evolved since it began at the school in the 2018- 19 school year,  and the PHS students for 2023- 2024 have set themselves a very ambitious timeframe. The competition is fierce!

Hopefully the students' video is accepted, and the students will be invited to the World Championships in Tennessee to represent our Territory.