NANKIN — More than 250 people from 60 teams descended on the gym at Mapleton Local Schools Saturday for a robotics event, hoping for a chance to qualify for the state tournament in March.
Craig Wentworth, the robotics coach and director of technology at Mapleton, said teams from as close as Lexington and as far as Cincinnati arrived for Saturday’s competition.
Wentworth’s team at Mapleton has 21 total participants. The squad is split into seven different teams of three. Some compete at the middle school level and some compete at the elementary level.
His students started working on their robots in September.
“It’s very student-centered, but we do give some parameters,” he said.
Teams receive scores based on skills, competitions, notebooks students keep detailing their process and other factors.
Competitions pair two random squads together and they have to score points, with the highest scores winning.
At Mapleton’s practice early in the week, teams scrimmaged against each other and perfected programming and strategies.
The EGK Soccer Stars, a team comprised of fifth grade girls, said they were particularly proud of their notebook, where they’ve documented how their robot has changed since they started work on it.
Flame, another squad of elementary school boys, said they wanted to work on their communication with each other during the competition. They needed two more points at their last competition to qualify for state.
The boys felt confident that they’d fixed the issue ahead of Saturday, and would make up the points to qualify.
Gearbusterz, a group of middle school boys, hope they have a chance to repeat a trip to state this year. Last year, the trio was the top team in the state and qualified for the robotics worlds competition.
They said they didn’t place there, but learned a lot and want to try again.
The top two teams in both the elementary and middle school divisions Saturday qualified for state, Wentworth said.
As of 1:30 p.m. Saturday, Gearbusterz was Mapleton’s highest-ranked middle school team. Flame had the highest ranking for Mapleton’s elementary school teams.
None ended up qualifying for state by the competition’s end. Some teams did take home awards, though. Those awards follow:
- Judge’s Award — Concrete Blocks, a middle school team with Leo Hyel, Dominic Knighton and Amelia Ashley
- Create Award — EGK Soccer Stars, an elementary school team with Aubrey Elkins, Rylee George and Arabella Kucnick
- Amaze Award — Flame, an elementary school team with Trey Ortiz, Lincoln Wentworth and Max Beugly
- Teamwork Second Place — Flame, an elementary school team with Trey Ortiz, Lincoln Wentworth and Max Beugly
After this competition, Mapleton students will have one more opportunity — a tournament on Feb. 24 — to qualify before the end of the season.
More than anything, Mapleton’s team members shared stories of problem solving, talking about how they’ve worked together to modify their robots’ design and maximize their point totals during competition.
Below are photos from Saturday’s tournament at Mapleton.
