Madeleine
Whew.
It took months of preparation and six long weeks of build, but I am
happy to tell you that FIRST Team 677 finally made it through our season!
At the end of March we were able to
travel up to Cleveland to compete in the FIRST Buckeye Regional with 58 other
teams from Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Maryland and Canada. It was so cool to
be able to see all of the designs and fabrications that teams had developed
over the course of their season and compare their designs to the ones we had on
our robot.
Our robot performed exceptionally well
at competition. We were able to compete in all of our matches and score lots of
points for our team. Not only were we able to shoot and score baskets with the
basketballs but our driver, Tiffany, was also able to balance our robot on two
of the balancing bridges in the center of the field. This task was really hard
but it earned our team at least 10 points and helped us to win many of our
matches! Because of our robot performance, we were picked to be part of an
alliance team for the finals of the competition. Only 24 teams compete in the
finals so it was an honor that we were chosen to compete. Unfortunately, we
were eliminated in the last game of a best 2 out of 3 set in the first round of
finals but our entire alliance put up a fantastic effort!
It was so exciting to be able to attend
competition and have our robot perform so well. I am excited to see what lies
in store for the team next year and in the years to come!
Kalki
From
March 23 – 25, the Upper School’s FIRST Robotics Team went to the Buckeye
Regional in Cleveland, Ohio. This was my first year on Murphy’s Outlaws and
therefore my first time going on the trip. I had so much fun. We competed
against other teams from Canada, New York, Pennsylvania, and of course Ohio.
The robots’ main functions were picking up balls, shooting them in baskets, and
balancing on bridges and our robot did amazingly! This year was the first time
we made an alliance in a while (which means we made it to the quarterfinals)
and we were also the best at balancing our robot on a bridge. In addition
to watching our robot play basketball, I got to meet so many other students on
FIRST Robotics and watch the amazing robots everyone else built. After working
for six weeks on the robot, it was so exciting watching it compete.
Unfortunately, we lost in the quarterfinals, but it was a fantastic season and I
cannot wait until next year!
Last week was our first week back from spring break. Everyone was so excited to
see each other after a relaxing two weeks and for me I was ready to get back in
the swing of things. Early Monday morning I turned in my tentative thesis
statement for my British Literature Class. We are currently writing our last research paper
about well-known British authors. I have Katherine Mansfield, the famous
short story writer. The next class, my teacher Dr. Leahy decided to read all of
our thesis statements aloud so the class could provide us with feedback. At first, I was nervous
because I did not want everyone to hear my thesis, but it turned out to be
helpful! My classmates gave me good advice and the experience was not awkward at all. We
actually had loads of fun going over things to fix. By fixing our theses, we
all improved our research papers.
Jessie
From
Relaxing to Robotics, i.e. What I Did Over Spring Break
Overall, I had a
wonderful spring break relaxing and participating in my favorite activity,
FIRST Robotics.
