Robosapiens

FIRST LEGO League National championships

On a very hot and humid Saturday the 3rd of December, two robotics teams (Red Bulls and Monsters) from MGSC went to take part in the FIRST LEGO League Challenge at Wallarano Primary School for the Southern Nationals. Both teams were continuing with the competition as they qualified at the Wantirna Regionals which we attended in November. 

In the lead up to the Southern Nationals, both teams prepared for the competition during Wednesday and Friday lunchtimes and two whole day intensive sessions. Both teams used the feedback from the judges in the Regionals to refine their robot coding and presentation. 

As a result of the judging feedback, the Red Bulls focused on perfecting their robot game and they managed to achieve great improvement on the day. They ranked 19th out of 40 teams present on the day for the robot game with a maximum score of 195. They also practised their solar powered car presentation until it was perfect. 

Meanwhile, the Monsters tweaked their Innovation Project to include a nuclear power plant safety robot they named MEGA-VH. MEGA-VH’s aim was to detect large amounts of dangerous gases or radiation levels as well as fix those problems so that a human will not need to be onsite to manage a nuclear power plant. 

The stressful build up to the competition consisted of two long days of hard work without classes, and codes, creating robots and making gifts to bribe the judges (kidding). Both teams worked hard and gave up class time to make sure they completed the things they needed to succeed. On the day of the competition there were at least 40 teams from Tasmania, South Australia and Victoria, seeing these teams made both the Red Bulls and Monsters nervous but excited. We were glad to have Ms Leong and Mr Verimeiff as our coaches to support us and help us get through the nine hour long day.

Both teams did amazingly, with Monsters placing 13th and Red Bulls placing 19th on the robot game. We would like to congratulate Monsters on winning the Motivation Award and thank Ms Leong and Mr Verimeiff for sticking with us through this long journey and we are excited to compete again next year and maybe even compete in the internationals.

Anuki Udawattha and Millie Bennett (Year 8)