You could have shared the pool with robots at the Door County YMCA in Sturgeon Bay on Thursday.

Five middle school teams from Washington Island School and one from Sevastopol participated in the Door County SeaPerch competition ahead of next month’s regionals at Ashwaubenon High School. Sponsored by the North Coast Marine Manufacturing Alliance and supported in part by the Door County Maritime Museum, SeaPerch is an underwater robotics program to complement a school’s Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) programming. The students designed and built their robots before placing them into the water to run them through an obstacle course.

Sevastopol’s Daniel Castillo, Austin Pagels, and Luke Filar said afterward that the experience is a great introduction to possible careers down the road.

Sevastopol took second place at the regional SeaPerch competition in 2020. They were planning to compete at the International SeaPerch Challenge at the University of Maryland before the event was canceled due to the pandemic.