More Robotics Qualifies For Vex Robotics World Championship

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MORE ROBOTICS QUALIFIES FOR VEX ROBOTICS WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP

On Saturday, November 6, 2010 twenty four teams from Milwaukee and Waukesha counties competed in the Fall High School Vex Challenge held at St. Thomas More High School in Milwaukee. This year's competition challenge is VEX Round Up. For the past several weeks students have been designing, building, and programming robots using the VEX Robotics Design System to complete the challenge. The object of the game is to attain a higher score than your opponent alliance by scoring tubes upon goalposts, owning goalposts, and by hanging from a ladder. A bonus is awarded to the alliance that has the most total points at the end of the autonomous period.

VEX Round Up is played on a 12’x12’ square field. Two alliances, composed of two teams each, compete in matches consisting of a twenty-second autonomous period followed by two minutes of driver-controlled play. After a full day of qualification and elimination matches six teams remained to vie to be Tournament Champions.

Students, with guidance from their teachers and mentors, aim to build the most innovative robots from the VEX Robotics Design System, then work together to obtain the most points possible on the field of competition. In addition to having a great time and building complex robots, students learn many academic and life skills.

The VEX Robotics Competition is the largest and fastest growing middle and high school robotics program globally with more than 2,600 teams from 20 countries and four continents playing in over 200 tournaments worldwide.

Three teams from this event have qualified to attend the 2011 VEX Robotics World Championship which will be held at the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex at the Walt Disney World® Resort on April 14-16, 2011. Coinciding with National Robotics Week, the three-day tournament unites top middle school, high school and college robotics teams from around the world to celebrate their accomplishments and further inspire students to pursue careers in robotics and other STEM related fields. The qualifying teams were 1714A, 1714B, and 1714H. 1714A won the most prestigious Excellence Award, taking into account all aspects of the competition. The alliance of 1714A, 1714B, and 1714H were the Tournament Champions based on robot performance in competition rounds. 1714A won the Robot Skills Challenge Award for their ability to score the most points, while 1714B won the Programming Skills Challenge for their ability to score the most points in the autonomous mode.

These winning teams were comprised of students from MORE Robotics, FRC Team 1714. MORE Robotics is a community engineering club that mentors elementary and high school students to compete in several robotics competitions including the VEX and FIRST programs. FIRST stands for For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology, and has the goal to promote STEM education through robotics competitions.