Archive: Around Town

This past weekend, Code Red Robotics, the Ithaca High School’s FIRST (For the Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) robotics team, attended the FIRST World Championships in St. Louis, Missouri.

The team made a stunning comeback after seeding 88th out of 100 teams in their division by being selected by the third ranked team to compete in the elimination tournament. The alliance consisted of Code Red Robotics from Ithaca, NY, Truck Town Thunder from Ortonville, MI, and the Beach Bots from Hermosa Beach, CA. This alliance, stretching through the continental United States, blazed through the competition, making it all the way to the divisional finals. There were 400 teams competing in four divisions.

In the quarterfinals, Code Red defeated the defending world champion, as well as a FIRST Hall of Fame member. In the semifinals, the alliance upset the second ranked alliance, a powerhouse alliance with a combined record of six regional wins during the season. Unfortunately, Code Red was defeated in the divisional finals by the first ranked alliance. Nevertheless, all the hard work from the team certainly paid off, because Code Red finished in the top 1 percent of all teams worldwide, and made it farther than all other New York state teams.

Code Red Robotics is part of FIRST, an organization designed to increase technology awareness. Each year, FIRST creates a new challenge for the teams to tackle. This year’s competition is known as Rebound Rumble and is based on a game of basketball. Teams compete to utilize their 120-pound robots in order to score as many basketballs into four hoops at either end of the field as they can during a two minute and 15 second match. The higher the hoop in which the basketball is scored, the more points the alliance receives. The robots, at the end of the match, will also attempt to balance on bridges located at the middle of the field for the additional opportunity to earn bonus points.

This year, Code Red Robotics is composed of 57 students and 20 professional mentors. They are proud to inspire students through hands-on experiences, education, and opportunity in multiple fields of engineering, community service, finance, leadership, effective communication, and teamwork. Students lead the team in tackling the facets of operation, including organization, fundraising, public relations, engineering, and documentation.

In addition, the team focuses on providing for its supportive home community, and through community service, public demonstrations, and mentoring FIRST programs for younger ages, they inspire younger engineers. Recently, Code Red has also won $1000 for selling more energy-efficient LED light bulbs than all other team except one. The light bulb fundraising program helps the environment and supports team sustainability efforts.

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