The Geography Club hosted its annual scuba diving lesson on Wednesday, Feb. 24, in LHS’ pool. It was a successful event with a record high turn out of 28 students.

   “It is the largest crowd we have ever had participate, and there was a lot of positive energy and excitement in the old Carl Knox center,” Geography Club sponsor David Platt said. “Anytime students learn and experience new skills is exciting.”

   The students were instructed by Dave Bach and Lori Tilson from Scuba Shack, 1035 New Jersey St., a local dive shop. They started out showing everyone how to use the equipment in the shallow end, had students swim laps once they got the hang of it and then took them to the deep end to swim around.

   “The purpose of this is to allow kids to have an experience that they might not normally have in Kansas,” Platt said. “In terms of geography, scuba can be a tool to explore the world around us, and in terms of our club, we have several students going with us to the Great Barrier Reef. We want to explore it. By using scuba, we will get a more complete view of the reef systems.”

   It varies from year to year, season to season, on how many students show up for this event, but this year had the best turnout of all, and most people really enjoyed it.

   “I wanted to do it because I’ve never scuba dived before, and I didn’t know when I was going to get my first opportunity,” senior Steven Melton said.

   As long long as there is a demand for these lessons, the Geography Club intends to continue this event in years to come.

   “I can’t wait to go scuba diving with the sharks in Austrailia,” senior Ben Muiller said.