Cordova High School’s robotics team, the smallest public school in attendance, traveled to Eagle River on Dec. 8-9 to compete in the FIRST Tech Challenge Southcentral qualifiers against 19 other teams from the Anchorage and MatSu area.
Cordova held its ground against the 4A and veteran teams, winning three of six matches, ranking 10th place overall. This was a huge accomplishment, as six of the teams attending this event won state awards last year and two of them were in finals at the world championships.
The CHS Robotics team doubled in size this year, with 10 students participating: freshman T.J. Hatch; sophomores Ethan Beckett, Kevin Chung, Tristan Glasen, James Griffith, Jackson Perry, James Perry, Emory Vican and Micah Whitcomb; and junior Dylan Maloney. The students have been working on their robot since September, applying the lessons and experiences from last year towards making a more robust versatile robot.
The FTC competition matches combine four teams at once into a 12×12 foot playing field with two teams forming an alliance for red and blue sides. The matches start with a 30 second autonomous period (fully automated with programming), which is followed immediately by a two-minute driver period. Every season the playing field and game challenges change, requiring students to design and build robots unique for the identified tasks.
During the Southcentral qualifier, one match had a perfect autonomous score of 85 points, something not achieved last season. During the matches, CHS scored in the middle of pack, but brought home a tremendous amount of knowledge and ideas for improving the next version of the robot. Everyone on the team had the opportunity to participate in the matches and overall it was a very exciting competition day.
Based on the competition scoring system and existing teams advancements Cordova was fortunate to secure the sixth and final spot from these regional qualifiers to advance to state. Cordova will compete in one more event in January to help prepare for state competition in February.
Jeremiah Beckett is the CHS Tech Club advisor.
