The Charging Champions robotics team, consisting of 21 high school students from Irvine Unified School District (IUSD), is preparing for the upcoming robotic competition in Houston. The first robotics competition which occurs April 19-22 gives students the opportunity to showcase their engineering skills.
Junior Noopur Siroya and freshman Aryan Mathur will competed in the recent competition. Along with being the first robotics competition of this time it enticed new faces to the robotics world to compete.
“This year we have a rookie team. I want to say we are prepared as a team but not compared to some of the teams that have been here for 10 or 20 years,” Siroya said.
Every year, the Charging Champions recruits new team members through a delicate interview process which includes a questionnaire session, as well as a practical session where candidates reveal their skills with robotics.
The robotics community is lead by the parents of Portola High freshman Anish Joshi and University High freshman Arjun Neervannan. From planning blueprints of robots to physically assembling robots, the team relies on collaboration between members.
The atmosphere breeds a kinship among members and helps to develop communication skills under the stressful environment. Robotics club member Siroya has overall positive experience with the robotics community and gets along well with her teammates.
“It’s fun, you get to learn a lot of new things like engineering. My favorite moment is when we have team lunches because we play soccer and cards together,” Siroya said.
The variety of activities shared by the club members helps to enhance the camaraderie between team members.Mathur has also had a positive experience and believes his team is ready for the upcoming competition.
“We have already made a plan for how our robotics can change, and how it can perform better in the world championship,” Mathur said.
Different robotics communities have their different styles and preparations as well as various students tending to take different things away from robotics.
“I hope to establish a strong robotics program at Woodbridge, starting with our extracurricular robotics team,” junior Patrick Park said. “It would be great to extend that into official classes to keep that legacy and help Woodbridge students remain competitive among the stars.”
Siroya and Mathur are not done with robotics after this competition as they both plan to continue with robotics next year.