Chief judge, Dame Anne Salmond, whose recent book "The Trial of the Cannibal Dog" provided a good reference work for many of the teams, said that "the students gave us very competent, informative and, in some cases, highly entertaining, documentaries and dramatisations of European and Pacific voyaging, and the history of astronomy and the Transit of Venus. The three winning entries we have chosen had what you might call the "X factor".
"There were noteworthy aspects of all the finalists: the Burnside girls had a good creative concept (Venus Television) and made great use of local talent; the Macleans College entry was highly aesthetic and original; Northcote College showed a wonderful sense of humour; Tauranga College had a very good original score; St Cuthberts' College bravely tackled the difficult topic of dark matter (the only ones to do so); and Wellington Girls showed their authoritative grasp of the topic. You could see that many, many hours had gone into these projects, but that they had also had lots of fun as well."
The Royal Society staff also commended the entries by St John's College in Hamilton, and Hauraki Plains College in Ngatea. In a true spirit of scientific enquiry, the St John's team camped out all weekend simulating the hardships of long Pacific and European voyages. The Hauraki Plains team used the local history relating to Cook's first voyage as the basis for their very informative video.
Freemasons New Zealand, which has sponsored the competition, were so impressed by the finalists that they have decided to bring the other seven teams to Wellington for the big event at Te Papa on the night of the Transit, Tuesday 8 June.

• Video
• 2004 Transit of Venus Expedition Schools Competition
• Schools entered in Transit of Venus competition

• ASTRONOMY
• COOK'S EXPLORATIONS
• WAKA VOYAGING