Clemente Grabs Silver at Robotics Competition

Congratulations to the Clemente Wildcat Robotics Team; its coach, Ms Hicks; volunteer staff, Mr Lopez; and the two engineers from Motorola who assisted them on their Silver Medal finish at the FIRST Robotics World Championship over the weekend in Atlanta. The Clemente team, sponsored by the Motorola Foundation, is made up of high school students and engineers. To make it into the finals, the Clemente Team, The Robocats, had to play in ten qualifying matches on Thursday through Saturday. Their performance during those matches was phenomenal enough to allow them to be picked by the first seeded team to form a three team alliance. This final alliance consisted of number one seed, Simbotics from St. Catharines, Ontario, and a team from Bloomfield, MI, Las Guerrillas. As an alliance, these three teams went on to win six straight matches and clinch the Curie Division Gold medal. Their divisional title qualified them to play in the Championship finals where they won both semi-final matches only losing in the finals.

Engineers have been working with Clemente students to design, build, and test the winning robot since early January and have attended events in Chicago and Minnesota. The Robocats were eliminated in the quarter finals in Chicago but took Silver in the Minnesota Northstar Regional against an alliance including four time World Champions Team Hammond, from Hammond, IN. The overall record for the Robocats in 2010 is 27-18-4 (W-L-T).

FIRST, For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology, is the brainchild of inventor Dean Kamen and MIT mechanical engineering professor Woodie Flowers. The organization uses robot building to inspire students from early primary school age through high school. The high school competition First Robotics Competition consists of 1,808 teams, with 45,200 high-school students (Grades 9-12) from 12 countries. The entire FIRST family of programs has 212,000+ students, 19,144 teams, 17,644 robots, 57,000+ mentors/adult supporters, 33,000+ event volunteers worldwide. Additional