Farmingdale High School gives all students who attend a wide variety of clubs to join throughout the year. One club in particular that has recently been succeeding is the Robotics club. Robotics is a club that works toward winning regional competitions each year, with dedicated students, and a dedicated staff who put in hours upon hours worth of time into each and every project.

In the 2016- 2017 season, the Robotics Club accomplished several achievements. The Robotics Club is coached by Mrs. Grady, a staff member in the science department at Farmingdale High School. The club contains three teams; Robodalers, Dalerbots, and VEXcalibur, each containing around five to seven students. Each team has been successful in their own regard. The Robotics Club won two tournament championships, one Overall Skills Award, one Programming Skills Award, and one Build Award. To add to this, most recently, on March 4th, 2017, the Robotics team went to states, and are now tournament champions. In this competition, all three of the team’s robots finished in the top ten, defeating thirty- nine other teams. This is incredible and truly shows that hard work pays off. According to Mrs. Grady,  “Students on the Robotics team are expected to spend about 8 hours per week working with their team after school, in addition to 12-hour competition days on some weekends. Clearly, dedication is a must.” Each student is dedicated and puts in all of this time, and the students seem to really enjoy it. Senior Abigail Grote reflected on her favorite part of the experience: “This is a hard question because there really is so much to love about this club, but I would have to say strategy at the competitions, because there is so much that happens during the competitions. One person on the team is in charge of deciding what moves the robot does on the field to score points, and who we work with at the competition. It’s such an ‘in the moment’ kind of job that it really keeps you on your toes because of how fast you might have to change your current strategy.” The competitions are challenging, the the rewards are worth it.

Keep an eye out for the Robotics team at Farmingdale High School as they approach the world competitions, which will take place in Kentucky. The students continue to work hard for the future as they look to bring home another trophy to add to the collection.

* Photo from FHS Twitter Account