McFadden and Ross sail with trigonometry

Preparing for Command

Surface warfare officer Ensign Chrystal McFadden has big responsibilities on the massive U.S.S. Bonhomme Richard

SAN FRANCISCO -- One hundred and seventy years after William Alexander Leidesdorff first sailed a ship into the San Francisco Bay, two ambitious U.S. Navy veterans are hard at work bringing a 1,000 ton vessel with an equally historic name into ports across the Pacific.

Ensign Chystal McFadden, a native of Chicago who joined the Navy after finishing Chicago Public Schools, and Quartermaster Katisha M. Ross, who joined the service from Mississippi, are featured in the SeaChange segment "Ain't No Stoppin' This Ship: Sailing with Trigonometry by McFadden and Ross.

SeaChange

Two sailors demonstrating math and science

SeaChange is one of the distinctive psycho-social interventions provided through daily programs on ReUnion: Education-Arts-Heritage.   Geared to African-American high school students, it demonstrates mathematics and science principles through interactive learning challenges with contemporary and historic role models.

Navigating with charts

Quartermaster Katisha M. Ross demonstrates the distance triange as Ensign McFadden observes

The segment was shot aboard the U.S.S. Bonhomme Richard, an amphibious assault vessel, which carries 3,000 sailors and Marines along with an array of helicopters and fixed wing aircraft with amphibious landing craft in its bay.

McFadden and Ross show how trigonometry is valuable in the navigation of the 1,000 ton ship.   Exercises also provide teachers and administrators with the opportunity to use these compelling figures to combat truancy.

Future segments include the current mission of the U.S. Coast Guard icebreaker Capt. Michael Healy, named after the 19th century black Revenue Cutter Service captain who was military governor of Alaska, to do research at the North Pole with students from the University of South Florida.