The Odyssey of the Mind World Finals are complete. The scores are in. The awards have been given. And we’re all heading home.

Among the Balsa Builders, where we spent a lot of time observing the action, the Middle School teams out performed the High Schools. No High School team this year built a structure that held over 1000 pounds — the best, 980, was achieved by two teams –, but no less than 5 Middle School teams held over 1000. The top Middle School team held 1220. But that was overshadowed by the performance of a structure build by Elementary School students from Oak Hill Elementary in Herndon, VA which held 1280 pounds.

Our buddy team from Guangdong, China finished second in the Middle School division of the small vehicle problem, Tag ‘Em.

And our team from Smith Middle School in Chapel Hill, NC finished 10th in their problem, The Large and Small of It.

We’re all packing up and heading out.

Synopsis of next year’s problems
are already posted. Information about finding OotM (the preferred abreviation of Odyssey of the Mind) can be found by contacting your state or country directors.

Note: My entire OttM 2007 collection of stories with pictures is over at GeekDad.Com.