WARRENTON — For many Warrenton Middle School teachers, the 3:30 bell means the end of the school day — but on a recent Tuesday afternoon, the door to Heidi Lent’s classroom was wide open.

Inside, a group of students from the district’s top underwater robotics team, The Rays, was just getting started on an evening of planning and problem solving.

Lent founded Warrenton’s underwater robotics club nearly a decade ago — and in that time, she’s watched it grow in leaps and bounds. Earlier this month, The Rays took first place at the annual Oregon MATE ROV competition in Newport. Now, they’re headed to Alpena, Michigan in June for the 2025 world championships.

MATE ROV (Marine Advanced Technology Education Remotely Operated Vehicle) competitions give teams an opportunity to use self-made underwater robots to complete challenges in an indoor pool. Teams competing at the highest level — like The Rays — aren’t allowed to look in the pool, and instead rely on waterproofed cameras to navigate and execute tasks. The idea is to simulate real-world challenges, like taking water samples and picking up coral or debris.

In addition to building and operating their machine, teams also give an oral presentation and submit a marketing poster with information about their team and project.

“The cool factor for me is that these kids are doing things that are well beyond what I do,” Lent said.

Over the past year, The Rays have put hours of work into building a remotely operated vehicle. Owen Cross, a Warrenton High School sophomore, said the machine includes three waterproof canisters — each equipped with a camera — two claws for grabbing objects, and plenty of other high-tech features. Meanwhile, eighth-grader Daniel Myrvold has spent all year designing a float to accompany the machine.

The float collects pressure and temperature data from the pool, which is then sent wirelessly to the team’s computer. Myrvold said the process of building it has included plenty of trial and error, and he’s had to remake and reprint many of its parts.

“There’s so many things that go wrong, and that’s what they have to figure out all year,” Lent said.

In the coming weeks, the team’s five members will be blazing through a long to-do list to prepare for the world championship. That list includes refining their machine and continuing to practice at the Sunset Empire Park and Recreation District pool in Seaside — but it also includes editing more than half a dozen documents, from a corporate responsibility sheet to a job safety environment analysis.

Another element will be fundraising. Lent said the team has a goal of raising between $2,000 and $6,000 to help get them to Alpena to participate in the competition. On May 29, they’ll be holding an open house at Warrenton Middle School from 4:30 to 6 p.m. to show off their underwater robot and raise support.

This is the team’s third time going to the world championship in four years. Cross said one of his favorite parts of competitions is getting the chance to connect with other teams from all over the country and world.

“Coming from this town, there’s not a lot of people that fully understand what we’re doing or kind of understand this,” he said. “Coming up to Worlds is pretty much just a giant event that has all these other kids that are kind of like us. And just talking to them and kind of throwing ideas back and forth with them is the biggest thing I enjoy doing.”

The competition also offers students a chance to envision a potential future in engineering. Cross and Myrvold both already have their sights set on Oregon State University for electrical engineering degrees. Meanwhile, Micah Larson, a ninth-grader on the team, said working through challenges in underwater robotics has helped him see a future in software engineering.

He remembers trying to build a float for one competition. The software worked, but the mechanics fell through.

“Before I started doing this program, I was completely unsure,” Larson said. “I vaguely thought engineering is interesting, but I didn’t think software engineering until my second year, I think, when I was tasked with trying to build one of those.”

As the team ramps up for Michigan, it doesn’t take much to recognize the pride Lent takes in their accomplishments. Just outside her classroom door, a trophy case is filled with awards from years past — and on the glass, there’s a list of the different teams’ wins by year. She’s already used her Cricut machine to cut out a label for the program’s latest achievement: 2025 high school state champions.

With any luck, she’ll be making a similar one by late June.