The Steel Eels robotics team from P.K. Yonge Developmental Research School in Gainesville has qualified for the FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC) Florida Championships.
According to a release, the Eels are one of 60 teams that will compete in the event, which will take place March 6-7 at the AdventHealth Fieldhouse and Conference Center in Winter Haven.
Of the 60 teams competing in the FTC Florida Championships, the release said nine will move on to the FIRST Championship, also known as the world championship, in Houston, and 13 teams will advance to other premier events around the nation.
The Eels team consists of eighth through 12th graders at P.K. Yonge, some of whom, the release said, have competed with the team in years past. This season, the Eels participated in the Northeast Florida region, which had 38 teams.
The Eels are one of just eight teams advancing to the FTC Florida Championships from their region after placing seventh in the Northeast Regional First Tech Challenge.
This year, the FTC Challenge game is “Decode.” The challenge consists of the robot picking up purple or green balls, called artifacts, and firing them into a capture pylon, labeled as a classifier. Before each round, a coded pattern is given, and extra points are earned if the team scores the colored artifacts in that pattern.
The robotics challenge consists of a period where the robot runs autonomously, as well as a portion where the robot is controlled by a driver. In addition to the robotics portion, teams must present a portfolio of their season, which includes robot design, outlines of their creative process and outreach opportunities the team participated in.
In addition to a successful robotics competition, the Eels won the Connect Award at the regional competition. The release said that this award “is given to the team with the most impressive and diverse outreach.”
According to the release, “FIRST is one of the largest K-12 robotics programs in the state of Florida, with more than 250 teams participating in the FIRST Tech Challenge alone.”
The Eels are Alachua County’s only FIRST Tech Challenge team, the release said.
A GoFundMe has been set up to help raise funds for the Eels’ trip to the FTC Florida Championships. Anyone interested in supporting the team can visit http://gofund.me/2536b16e5.