One of Darlington's two robotics teams took top honors at the FIRST Tech Challenge this past Saturday at Southern Polytechnic State University in Marietta, Ga.
The DarBots4100 team represented one of 23 schools present at the championship tournament, and received the highest rankings across all categories, including Robot Performance, Robot Design, Engineering Process, and Community Outreach, winning the Inspire Award.
A variety of challenges were used to test the accuracy of the robot's coding and the integrity of the construction of the machine. Each competing robot was examined on-site and judged by a panel. All participating teams presented on the robot-building process and each team member's role that helped bring the machines to life.
"Winning the Inspire Award was big," said Ian Kinney, Darlington sophomore and DarBots4100 team member. "We won 10 games in a row with barely any flaws in our robot, just some minor programming issues."
DarBots4100's success at Saturday's tournament automatically secured a spot for the school in the FIRST Tech Challenge State Championship on Feb. 14, 2015, also at Southern Polytechnic State University.
"We have another [regional] competition coming up Jan. 31 where both [DarBots4100] and 5100 will compete," said Henrik Malmberg, DarBots coach and Darlington science teacher. "Team 5100 still needs to qualify for the state championship and 4100 will be there to hone their skills and help them out."
Last year members from Darlington's robotics program went as far as the national FIRST Tech Challenge championship in Texas.
"I'm very proud of their performance and would love for them to stand in the spotlight," said Malmberg.
Team members who were present and competed in the FIRST Tech Challenge championship were freshmen Robert Chen, Oliver Wang and Philip Woford, sophomores Ash Herndon and Ian Kinney, and seniors Moana Kubo and Stevenson Walker.
The FIRST Tech Challenge was developed for students to be able to create robots while applying and learning math, science, problem-solving and team-building skills, ultimately gaining participants the opportunity to qualify for college scholarships. For more information, click here.
