The Robotics Club started their season in early November at Don Bosco Prep where they lost 4 out of 6 matches.
Robotics club advisor, Dr. Houston, has been coaching this club for 12 years and he believes that the team will have a quick turnaround in December. “Our first meet was at Don Bosco Prep School. We did okay, it’s early in the season and we are still working out some of the kinks.”
Houston believes the team could practice more, test the robots more, make sure that the robots are working at their 100% capacity.
According to Houston, the team comprises of 5 main build members, plus a dozen kids who help keep the club running by fundraising and making posters.
Houston implied, “They need to practice more. They spend a lot of time fiddling around [changing the build] and they need to stop at some point and just start practicing the game.” He believes with a change in hard work and strategy, they could potentially have a lot of success.
Robotics team member and robot mechanic, Zachary Neben, is enthusiastic about the club and the direction the team is heading in to achieve success. Although Zach didn’t attend the first meet, he still had a lot to say for it. “Even though I wasn’t at the first meet, I still know partially why we lost those games. The drivers of the robots weren’t able to score enough points, and the other team was much better than them.”
Neben continued, “Every robotics team builds robots, and once a month they meet up at one school to have the competition on a Saturday or Sunday. One round consists of four teams total, but two teams merge for a red side and a blue side. Whoever scores the most points wins, and you score by putting hexagon pixels on a board. There are different colored hexagon pixels, and they are worth different points. There is also a 3D printed thing your team makes that gets you some extra points at the end.”
When the team competed a second time on December 10th Dr. Houston’s prediction came true. According to a school wide email, sent on the 11th, he championed the team:
“The stem club had an outstanding day on Sunday winning all five of their matches at the River Dell hosted robotics meet. This improves their record to 7-3 and their standing to 6th out of 20 teams in the East Bergen Conference. The standings are based on the team’s best 10 matches. The STEM club is scheduled to compete in one more meet in January before the conference championships,” wrote Houston proudly.
