19 teams competed Saturday at a Robotics Meet in Floydada (Photo courtesy of Shauna Lane, FCISD)
FLOYDADA, TX – With a new school comes new opportunities, and last weekend, Floydada Collegiate ISD (FCISD) hosted the Lubbock-League B Robotics meet for the first time.
Shauna Lane, Dean of Academic Affairs at FCISD, explains that the robotics competition is more than building robots. FIRST Tech Challenge teams (up to 15 team members, grades 7-12) are challenged to design, build, program, and operate robots to compete in a head-to-head challenge in an alliance format.
The robot kit is reusable from year to year and can be coded using a variety of levels of Java-based programming. Teams design and build robots, raise funds, design, and market their team brand, and do community outreach to earn specific awards. Participants can also apply for college scholarships as part of the program.
Each season concludes with regional championship events and an exciting FIRST Championship.
On Saturday, Floydada hosted 19 teams in 23 qualifying rounds.
Toby Zepeda (8th grade) competed in five matches Saturday with the CEN-Unified (Collegiate Edu-Nation) Team coached by Dan Boren. Brandon Wickware and Tyree Johnson are team sponsors, while Rocket Vega and Harvey Garza serve as support and mentors as well.
Zepeda will again compete on December 3 during the second meet at Lubbock Cooper Middle School, while the third and final meet will be at Frenship High School.
