Duct Tape Boat Race A Splash at Birmingham's Derby Middle School

BIRMINGHAM, MI — For as long as they live, Jack O’Brien, Zayd Faraj and Hunter Kaplan will never forget the end of the 2016-17 school year. That’s because the trio won Derby Middle School’s annual duct tape boat race. Their cardboard and duct tape “vessel” sailed across the Birmingham school’s pool in a little more than a minute.

This is the fourth year that Derby Middle School has done a duct tape boat race at the end of the school year. The idea came from eighth-grade math teacher Ben Thayer, who took part in a similar event while working in a previous teaching position.

“I came from Niles High School in southwestern Michigan, where we did a boat race like this on a nearby lake,” explained Thayer. “The kids seem to love it, and it really brings home a lot of the lessons they learn during the year.”

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Photo by Pat Pilon via Flickr Commons