The Robotics Program hosted its first-ever Raiders Revenge robotics competition on Saturday, Oct. 18, in the Blue Dungeon, marking a milestone for the robotics program as various school teams competed in a day full of innovative, intense, and competitive competition.
The event, organized entirely by the Robotics team, featured matches where the robots performed a variety of challenges, from stacking and sorting objects to maneuvering through obstacle courses. The nine teams of students work together in between rounds to improve and fix anything with their robot to better their performance.
“It’s the first time at Gulliver, and BB Raiders is the one hosting it. So it’s a big deal because it’s the first time for them, really, to kind of step into the main stage of first robotics and being a part of the actual events themselves, as opposed to just participating,” lead robotics mentor and biomedical science teacher Yoly McCarthy said.
The nine teams were all from Florida: RamTech, Sigma C@T Robotics Team, Children of the Swamp, Ninjineers, The Dirty Mechanics, The Wyld Stallins, BB-R8ERS, Buccaneer Robotics, and OTTER. In total, there were 14 different robots. This competition happened during the off-season, which is where the students can get organized, see how they build robots, and be able to compete in live competition to see what they need to adjust for the main season.
“When it’s off season, you kind of rush that whole thing into like two days, we are setting up from 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Usually competitions take two days or three days, and we’re doing it all in one day. So we’re here from around 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. doing this competition,” senior Uma Chainani said.
With strong competition, ultimately, there is a winner of the Raiders Revenge robotics competition.
“It’s two sides, competing against each other and each side has a group of three. It’s kind of like a bracket system, the teams are randomized every match during qualifying. There are three judges, and it’s basically a point system, so whoever scores more points based on the rule set, they win,” Robotics teacher Martin Saaverda said.
The goal of the robotics teams and competition is to teach important life skills, be able to problem solve, fail and learn, reprogram, and be involved in STEM, especially with a stronger girls presence.
“Increasing girls in STEM and showing everybody that it can be anyone in STEM is important, and that it is fun to do and it gets very competitive,” McCarthy said.
The robots are instructed to be pre-programmed in the minute of the “autonomous” period to move around or do tasks, which earns them a point. Then the students control the robot for the next 3 minutes of the game. The robot has been built since last year, but there have been fixes to it and improvements. It is two by two and a half feet, and three feet tall, and can extend to around six feet tall.
“Every off-season robot is the same as the one from the actual season prior,” Saaverda said.
The day was filled with excitement and pride, and team building to accomplish their goals at the special event. It brought them together as a team to learn and experience something that can benefit them later on in their robotics or engineering careers.
“Raiders Revenge is really cool because we get to see the entire team come together. It’s really about showing that everyone can do something, and by working together, we’re really able to accomplish a goal that we couldn’t on our own,” junior Logan Garcia said.
The day was full of learning experiences for the students as they faced challenges, but were able to push through and have a fun time. There were many parent volunteers, along with past alumni Greg Chase helping out.
With the long day they had, there were some mechanical and electrical complications, with every little system having small issues, like the communication from the laptop to the radio, but not the actual robot had malfunctions itself. RamTech were the winner, but after the 10 matches of competition, the BB Raiders were able to improve each round, to make it to the Semi Finals.
“At the end of the competition, a lot of teams stayed and helped deconstruct the pit after the long day, but overall the competition was really fun,” Chainani said.
The ultimate hope and goal is to make it to the World Championship in Texas, where hundreds of teams go and compete against each other. The BB Raiders believe they have what it takes to make it there this year.
“All the top teams from all over the world. And when we get there, then we compete against the top teams and then there’s a final match called the Einstein match. And that’s the one to win the world championship. So there’s a world championship every year and the goal is to try and make it there,” McCarthy said.
The success of this event, being the first of more to come, is a powerful and special experience for the students and team for Gulliver’s robotics and STEM program.
