Happy 100th Birthday, Skagit Valley College!
Around the Americas Expedition would not have made it around North and South America without an incredible partnership with the Skagit Valley College Marine Technology Center.
Before we ever left Anacortes, the SVC Marine Tech students, instructors, staff and volunteers spent months helping refit and prepare our 48-foot ketch, One Ocean, for a 14-month, 28,000+ nautical-mile expedition.
Together, we built, repaired, tested, modified, learned, and problem-solved our way toward the starting line. And then One Ocean sailed 28,000+ nautical miles around the Americas—through the Arctic, the Northwest Passage, the Southern Ocean, around Cape Horn, and across some pretty serious seas. With Marine Tech’s Director, Mike Beemer as the lead engineer, Marine Tech Alumni, Tim Vandenheuvel and our very own, Tess Schornack who accumulated credits with SVC while out on the expedition!
A sound and sturdy boat is the foundation of any ocean expedition, and we are incredibly grateful to the Marine Tech team for helping make One Ocean strong enough to take us there—and bring us home.
But this partnership was about much more than a boat. It was about students learning by doing, research meeting education, and a community coming together around one big idea: That North and South America is One Island, surrounded by One Ocean we all share.
SVC, thank you for believing in this adventure and for being part of the story from the very beginning.
Congratulations on 100 years of Skagit Valley College! ️
Here’s to the next 100 years of learning, innovation, and getting students out there to build, fix, explore, and change the world.
One Island. One Ocean. One incredible partnership.
#SkagitValleyCollege #SVC100 #MarineTechnology #AroundTheAmericas #skallywags
