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Also known as Varsity Sport for the Mind, the competition combines the excitement of sport with the rigors of science and technology. During the competition, students are challenged to work cooperatively to build and program a robot to perform prescribed tasks against a field of competitors.
“Twenty students (including 6 females and 14 male students) on the CHS Robotics team participated in this year’s competition,” said Faculty Advisor and CHS Technology Teacher Don Saldicco.
Saldicco was assisted during the event by Jennifer Saldicco, and by Glenn Stefanski an engineer with GlobalFoundries, which endorsed the team.
The competition is unique in that participants are encouraged to practice gracious professionalism and to help other teams and cooperate while competing -- known as coopertition.
“It’s more than building robots,” described Saldicco. “Gracious professionalism is one area where the Carmel High School team was exceptional.”
For their efforts, the team received the "Rookie Inspiration Award" which celebrates a rookie team’s outstanding success in advancing respect and appreciation for engineering and engineers, both within their school, as well as in their community.
To help fund the competition, the team received two grants in the amount of $16,000 used for registration fees, robot parts, travel costs and marketing expenses. The team also received a $3,000 donation from Pepsi and a $500 Donation from All State Electric V3 Company.
“We placed 34 out of 36 teams at this regional level,” said Saldicco. “But we were only one of four rookie teams. So I would say we did pretty well considering most teams have been together for three years or more. This is just the beginning and there is much potential for the future."
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