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As teammates Paige Black and Lyden Raxter watch and assist, Cece Ward makes adjustments her team’s robot during Murphy Middle School’s final robot performance run in the FIRST Lego League robotics qualifying tournament on Nov. 23 in Blairsville, Ga. Photo by Samantha Sinclair
Dalton, Ga. - Murphy Middle School finished 11th overall after being the only school in Cherokee County to qualify for the FIRST Lego League Tennessee Valley Robotics Regional Tournament on Saturday at Eastbrook Middle School.
“I am so proud of how the team performed and maintained positive attitudes throughout all aspects of the competition,” coach David Decker said.
For the competition, the team first presented in the morning their project for making Murphy more eco-friendly, showing their robot design and understanding of the core values of the competition. In the afternoon, they performed three robot runs, scoring 265 points out of a possible 300 in the third run. It was the highest score in the school’s history at the competition.
It is the third time the team, Circuit Overload, has qualified for the regional championship tournament. The tournament included 32 teams from seven states.
Students on the team were Cece Ward, Jonah Hardin, Caleb Prohl, Lyden Raxter, Paige Black, Rosley Hall, Trey Swain, Aiden Hall, Emma White and Brody Helton. Decker coached the team with Brian Gatti.
“I’m really proud of these kids,” Decker said. “We’ve got a lot of people on our team who have been with us since sixth grade.”
The qualifying competition, held Nov. 23 at Union County Elementary School in Blairsville, included schools in Cherokee, Clay and Macon counties in western North Carolina as well as schools in Fannin, Hall, Hart, Lumpkin, Towns and Union counties in north Georgia. There were 22 teams registered for the competition, with Andrews Middle School, Hiwassee Dam Middle School, Martins Creek School and Ranger Elementary/Middle School also competing.
At that qualifying competition, the Robot Design Award for Strategy & Innovation trophy was awarded to Murphy Middle. The top eight schools were invited to the regional tournament in Dalton.
For the competition, each team built a robot and programmed it to complete tasks on a game board – like releasing a Lego swing or climbing a Lego bridge – to earn points. Each team’s best score out of three robot performance runs was combined with presentation scores in core values, robot design and solution project for the theme “City Shaper” to determine which teams qualify for the championship event.
After the robot runs, Andrews Middle had the highest score of all Cherokee County schools with 200 points.
“They have the best teamwork,” coach Amber Ledford said. “They each have their own special talents that contribute to their success.”
The younger teams in the competition saw it as a learning experience.
“I am so proud of them. None of us had ever done this before,” said Ranger Elementary’s new coach, Christine Jacobs.
Jacobs said her team practiced two hours a day after school for the last three weeks. They were supported by Ranger Middle’s team, led by the experienced Nancy Vento.
As the students waited for the scores to be tallied, Andrews Middle student Electa Tallant invited all participants to a game of duck-duck-goose, in which Cherokee County students easily outran all of the
competition.
Samantha Sinclair is the Scouting Around columnist for the Cherokee Scout. You can reach her by phone, 837-5122, Ext. 24; or email, scoutingaround@cherokee-scout.com.