The NOAA Chesapeake Bay Office helps a range of students—from elementary school through high school—build buoys to introduce them to concepts behind observational platforms and to help connect them with their local ecosystem—and to help track measurements in that ecosystem.

Basic Observation Buoys (BOBs): Middle and High School Students

Basic Observation Buoys—BOBs—can be built and deployed by teachers and students to enhance outdoor experiences that build upon the NOAA Chesapeake Exploration curriculum or other data-driven meaningful watershed educational experiences. The BOB is a small buoy that measures about 60 cm on a side and is built with basic PVC parts. The buoys are outfitted with sensors that can include air and water temperature, conductivity, salinity, pH, current speed, water depth, and dissolved oxygen.

Once constructed in the classroom, the buoy is deployed in partnership with a Riverkeeper or other citizen group in sheltered areas of the Bay. The data logger on the buoy records the data for several days; it can then be uploaded to the web on sites such as National Geographic FieldScope. This low-cost, high-tech buoy allows classrooms and communities to better understand and protect their local waterways.

Build-a-Buoy (BABs): Elementary and Middle School Students

Students as young as kindergarteners can learn basic principles of science, technology, engineering, and math, as well as marine navigation and observation, through Build-a-Buoy projects, where budding Bay stewards design and build the basic structure of a buoy using PVC pipe. The buoys must float in shallow water and incorporate a platform to hold golf balls or other similar objects. The students build the buoy, float it, and add golf balls until it tips over. Through this part of the exercise, the students learn concepts of buoyancy, symmetry, and balance.

When they are successful, students install an indoor/outdoor thermometer on the buoy and drop the "outdoor" sensor into the water. The buoy can then measure air and water temperature and thus becomes a simple observation buoy. Students learn that buoys have different functions: marking the boundaries of an underwater road, marking obstructions hidden underwater, and taking observations.