On Tuesday morning, Columba College students competed in the inaugural Ōtepoti Minecraft Mātauranga Build Challenge. Making up the Columba team were Year 7 students Emma Baskerville, Aisling Sievwright, Ailie Somerville and Allena Zhou.

The competition was held in Otago Museum's Hutton Theatre. Columba was one of nine teams in the competition, representing seven schools. The format of the competition gave each team two 10-minute sessions to build a Waka Hauora. Teams were judged by how well their builds communicated a story, on their team work, and on their execution.

The Columba team had a rocky start. They broke the teleporter that would take them to their building location and this cost them five minutes of their precious building time. Despite this set back, our team managed to complete an excellent build that incorporated their knowledge of materials, supplies and dyes available to early Polynesian explorers.

Unfortunately, Columba was unable to take home a prize at the end of the day. Regardless, Emma, Aisling, Ailie and Allena enjoyed the experience, represented Columba College with GRACE, and picked up some valuable tips for next year!