Ridge Elementary Robotics Team Wins World Design
Ridge Elementary School Robotics Team, RES Rock and Roll Rockets. Team members in the front row are Jasemine Edison, left, Destiny Deshields, Grace Anderson, Gabriel Cannavo, Luis Quinones, and Connor Tomasic. Coach David Cannavo is in the back row.
Ridge Elementary School might be one of the smallest elementary schools in St. Mary’s County, but that doesn’t keep students from achieving great things. The RES Rockets robotics team claimed the top award in its division for robot design, proving that big things really do come in small packages.
The 2016 VEX World Championship was held late last month in Louisville, KY, and hosted the top 1,000 teams from around the world. With more than 16,000 participants from 30 nations, the 2016 World Championship was the largest robotics competition ever held. Teams range from elementary through university level, all looking for the chance to be named the world’s best.
With 150 of the best teams in the world competing in the elementary school division, the Rockets had their work cut out for them. Three days of competition included programming skills, driver skills, STEM research presentation, 10 Alliance matches and the judges’ interviews. By the end of the second day, the team had completed all elements of the competition except eight alliance … or so they thought.
“We knew we had done well with the STEM presentation and the initial judging session, but when two sets of judges came back to interview the team a second time, I knew they were being considered for one of the big awards. I just wasn’t sure which one. Once the judges asked the team to pull up their autonomous program on the laptop, I figured it was for design,” said David Cannavo, the team’s coach. “Receiving the Design Award is an accomplishment at any level of competition, but having earned it at the World level is amazing. All their hard work paid off and I’m super proud of them!”
The Design Award is presented to the team that demonstrates a solid approach to the design process, project management, time; and team organization. The RES Rockets’ Engineering Notebook described how they created and implemented an efficient and productive process to manage their time and accomplish their project goals. The team was able to impress the judging team with their knowledge of the engineering process as well as their design and implementation of programming techniques to accomplish the game challenge.
In addition to the “robotic” elements of the VEX IQ program, teams participate in an “academic” element by completing a STEM research project. The RES Rockets project was “How Oyster Reefs Can Save the Bay.” The team partnered with St. Mary’s River Watershed Association to complete their project. After months of research and preparation, the team presented their project to the SMRWA Board of Directors and received a certificate naming them “Stewards of the Bay.” The board also unanimously approved a motion naming the RES Rockets team as partners in saving the bay.
As if winning a trophy was not achievement enough, the team also can take great pride in obtaining a perfect score (173) in its alliance match with its partners from China. They were the first alliance to get a perfect score and only one of three for the entire tournament. Although neither team was able to communicate with each other due to language barriers, they didn’t let that stand in their way in mastering the game field.
RES Rockets with the team from Shanghai, China
This is the team’s second trip to the world competition in as many years. The RES Robotics program began in 2014-2015 school year as a pilot program to introduce VEX IQ robotics at the elementary level. Thanks to a generous equipment donation by Northrop Grumman, the program was able to field two teams this season.
“It is through the generosity of our community that RES students are able to experience robotics. I have no doubt that some of the students will go on to become engineers, programmers, or other STEM professionals due to their participation in robotics. It is truly a wonderful tool to get students engaged and interested in STEM education and careers, ” said Sandra Kerner, principal of Ridge ES.
