On Saturday March 9th, Watertown’s Black Magic robotics team had their first competition of the season at Wilby High School. They placed 26 out of 32. While this wasn’t the outcome they expected, they are proud of the hard work they put into the robot and their teamwork during competition. In 2 weeks the team will be competing at WPI in Massachusetts in hopes of placing higher to be able to go to the District Championship.
The objective of this year’s competition was to place rings into the robot and shoot the rings into a goal. The more rings they shoot, the more points they gain. After the ring game was done, the robot would hang on a chain in the center of the game field. Depending on the competition, teams from different schools may have worked together to complete the task.
Watertown’s Black Magic team captain, senior, Gregory Collins, provided insight on how this year’s robot is unique, ¨My favorite part about it is we have a gyro in it where we press a button and it lines up to wherever we have to shoot it. We also use the trust to help us hang and hold where we need to be.¨ Gregory’s job was to help mentor the younger students as this was their first tournament. The main driver of the robot was Joe Collins and the fixer of the robot’s parts was Emily Whelton.
Advisor, Krisl Beres, shared the team’s motto, “It’s called gracious professionalism and cooperation. Those two are the ideals of this entire activity. This means in one match you could be competing against another team and the next match you’re working together. So if a robot is broken, or someone’s having a problem or if you need a part for the robot, we work together on helping each other even though we’re competing against each other.”
In preparation for Massachusetts, the team is reworking a few of the robot parts. Now that they have a better understanding of the playing field, they are making adjustments accordingly. Robotics is an opportunity for students to learn interpersonal skills, computer programming, elections, engineering, and business/marketing skills as they plan, build robots and meet other students from around the world through competitions and travel. Black Magic Robotics is open to any student in Watertown High School and Swift Middle School who are interested in testing their skills in technical engineering! If interested, contact Mrs. Beres: [email protected].
