CHCCS ARDF
2016-12-03, Fall #3
Event Report
Island Creative TimeThe family website of Kelly and Patrick Sears
This page is an event report for one of the Chapel Hill - Carrboro City Schools ARDF events directed by Kelly and Patrick Sears. For comments, suggestions, and questions; please contact Kelly Sears [ksears (at) chccs (dot) k12 (dot) nc (dot) us].
We had a super fun day. Our greatest ARDF event to date! A super thank you to all who came out and made this a wonderful time. And, again, it was a perfect day for running in the woods with the sun out the whole time. It started out cool and warmed up nicely as people were on course. As last time, we met in the Seawell Elementary School parking lot and the course was set in the adjacent section of Carolina North Forest. Eight teams went out! In total, we had 18 participants (9 middle school students and 8 family members). No high school students yet, maybe next time. Dale Haiducek (CTE teacher at Phillips) has become a regular supporter, coming to help out and try the course. As with last time, we also had help from Nadia and Charles Scharlau from the Backwoods Orienteering Klub (BOK). They helped teaching, taking students on the course, and picking up controls at the end. Thanks again guys!
We modeled an 80m classic ARDF event (5 foxes and one homing beacon). We also had a practice transmitter in the woods just next to the start. The full course distances were the same as last time: the straight-line best path through all the controls was 2 km. The longest distance across the course area was 1.1 km. But this time, fox-1 was especially difficult to get as it was at the very furthest tip of our course.
Again a hearty thanks goes out to the middle school and high school teachers who helped get the word out. Rachel Hopler (Science Teacher, Culbreth Middle School), Christine Lippy (Science Teacher, McDougle Middle School), Dale Haiducek (CTE Teacher, Phillips Middle School), Haley Wamble (Science Teacher, East Chapel Hill High School), SaCola Lehr (Media Specialist, Chapel Hill School), Paula Dey (Science Teacher, Carrboro High School). Thanks also to Marny Ruben (Principal at Seawell Elementary School) for the use of the Seawell area and Greg Kopsch (Park Manager at Caronlina North Forest) for the use of CNF. And once more, we especially thank Dale Haiducek for coming out to support us at the event.
We have a Participant Activities section rather than a Results section because most participants are still new to ARDF and we did not record time-on-course. Instead of a single class, we broke up into groups looking for the homing beacon while getting instruction and then continued onto the course. Some confident participants went out on the course straight off. Foxes #3, #4, and #5 were the closest, a bit over 200 m away. Fox #2 was a bit further. And fox #1 was the real tough one. We would love to comment about everyone's experience and all the fun stuff that happened. But for the first time, we have too many people to keep track of. Although I can't help mentioning finding Stella and her mother in the middle of the woods having a picnic, so cool ☺ ! Also, I have to say it was really satisfying to see all the groups going out as families and having fun together.
The entries are not listed in any particular order, it's just the order in which the sign-in sheets were stored. Some participants went out as a team, which is a real fun way to do it. Others worked independently to find transmitters, also much fun. We didn't make a note of which participants worked independently, so participants signing in together are listed here as a single group. The finds column notes the controls found: foxes 1 through 5 and the homing beacon (H). The time column is blank. We didn't keep track of the times. I think most everyone was done by 1 PM, but we were so busy we didn't note the exact time. The schools are abbreviated, Phillips (PMS), Smith (SMS).
| entry # | participants (school, grade) | finds | time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Andrew K Kang (SMS 6), Anton (brother, Seawell Elementary School), and mother. | H | --- |
| 2 | Avani Muldavin-Hoop (SMS 6) and mother Brenna. | 2 4 H | --- |
| 3 | Evan Milledge (SMS 6), father Tom, mother Gaolin. | 2 3 4 5 H | --- |
| 4 | Lucy Robinson (PMS 6) and Gabby Sielken (SMS 6). | 3 4 5 H | --- |
| 5 | Stella (SMS 6) and mother Sara. | 2 3 4 5 H | --- |
| 6 | Toby Reed (PMS 6) and father Jason. | 1 2 3 4 5 H | --- |
| 7 | Ewan Crain (SMS 7) and father Quentin. | 1 2 3 4 5 H | --- |
| 8 | Trey Demas (SMS 7) and father Jason | 1 2 3 4 5 H | --- |
Clicking pictures will bring up original full-sized versions. All participants are listed as seen in the picture from left to right.
Tom (father), Evan, and Gaolin (mother) not far from the practice transmitter, testing their receivers.
Trey and his father going over receiver tuning with Nadia (behind them and not visible in picture).
Anton and Andrew listening for the homing beacon.
Quentin (father) and Ewan starting out on the course.
Jason (father) and Toby finishing up their time on course. You can tell from the smiles that it was a good time.
Toby and his father showing the tags they collected. They found all five foxes and the homing beacon, and with good speed too. Outstanding!
Nadia (volunteer) and Trey not far from the practice transmitter.
Trey showing the finder tags he collected. Fantastic!
Trey and his father Jason by the refreshments table after a good time on course. This is where everyone congregates to talk about how it went.
Lucy and Gabby coming up the hill toward the finish. After a bit of instruction, they were adamant that they were going out together with no other help. And here they are bringing back a bunch of finder tags!
Gabby and Lucy showing of the tags for transmitters they found. Excellent!
Brenna (mother), Patrick (volunteer), and Avi coming up the hill toward the finish coming from their last find, Fox-4.
Gaolin (mother), Tom (father), and Evan at the refreshment table.
Evan showing of the tags he found. All 5 and the homing beacon. Good job! And he also found a pumpkin.
Brenna (mother) and Avi with 'flyer cards', ready to tell everyone about their discovery of ARDF.
Some of the group talking in front of the finish table.
Kelly Sears, our event director. All the hard work is paying off!
Charles (volunteer), Brenna (mother), Avi, and Nadia (volunteer).
Stella and Sara (mother) coming back up the hill to the finish.
Stella and Sara showing off the tags they collected. Brilliant!
Ewan and Quentin (father) showing off the tags they collected: All five foxes plus the homing beacon, even after a late start! Fabulous!
Toby finding fox-2. You can see him reaching for one of the "finder tags". And above him, one of the control flags. Fox-2 was one of the harder ones to find. [1]
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