Tualatin High school’s own VEX Robotics team has been busy, having already competed in their first two competitions, as well as inducting new members into the team.
VEX robotics is an organization that hosts all the competitions and is dedicated to inspiring young people to pursue computer science around the world, and Tualatin High school has competed within these competitions for the past several years.
In past years, the team has worked to design, build, program and test a robot that would be able to compete in a game assigned to them by VEX. For the past two years, the team has qualified for nationals, although they were unable to attend last year due to COVID-19.
This year, returning members began right away, designing a bot that possesses tank drive, a mechanism for lifting small objects and a conveyor belt system.
The team has also been working on recruiting new members, an effort that usually only adds five or fewer members in past years. Shockingly, some 70 people expressed an interest in joining the club and roughly 20 new members showed up for induction day, when they were organized by interest. The new members have begun training to join the competition as soon as possible.
“I hope we are able to make a team that is more competitive in our region,” Eric Blaettler, an engineer and builder for the team, said. “At the moment, I feel like our team has always been the team that just squeezed by to qualify [for nationals], but I believe we can become a more intimidating team in competitions.”
While the team has yet to win either of the competitions they have attended, they have many more on the docket for the weeks to come and high hopes for the future.
“We have been slowly placing better and better every competition, and our hope for a great season grows each time,” Ethan Marreel, head programmer for the team, said.