Buckingham
Robotics 5496
Year One
Our robotics club was started by a student, Arthur Page, who had been wanting to develop a team at Buckingham since 2012. His dream became a reality when a small group of students became interested in the club in 2014. The team worked hard to learn the basics about robotics during the off-season and made a test robot. All of this was made possible because of the hard work the students were willing to do and the help of the Vanden RoboVikes. Being a smaller school limited our resources during build season and made it to where we worked in a classroom. Through our motivation and teamwork, we made a robot that functioned properly and competed at the Sac Regional, which is where we made FIRST history by winning the Imagery Award as a rookie team.
Year Three
Our team started off the year strong with eight teams participating in VEX Starstruck, and two of those teams making it to regional playoffs. We also expanded the team from 15-20 members to 30-35 team members that consistently attend meetings. Some of the goals that we set for our team at the end of last year were to increase our community outreach and spread STEM education. This season, we achieved those goals by making presentations to some of the Intro to STEM classes at our school, volunteering at an elementary school’s robotics camp over the past summer, and putting on a robotics after-school program for another local elementary school in both the fall and the spring. This year, we built the best robot we have ever built, which carried us to playoffs at the Idaho Regional competition. We were also given the amazing experience of going to World Championships in Houston, Texas, where we gained new experiences, friendships, and an immense amount of knowledge that we will be implementing next year. For more updates from over the year, check our blog page.
Year Two
The Buckingham RoboKnights started off the year strong with a successful VEX program. One of our two VEX teams made it to San Jose for state championships, and the other got 8th place at regionals. A couple months later, we went to the 2016 FIRST Stronghold game reveal to learn that this year we had a challenge ahead. Over the course of the build season, we worked hard to build a successful robot that could break down barriers and shoot boulders into the other allies tower. Our robot’s name was Mordred. Mordred took us to Madera, Davis, and Idaho. In Madera, we rebuilt our robot in the pit, working hard to get it back up and working in time to compete. We competed in all of our matches, and although we had a rough weekend, we managed to hold our ground and prepare for Davis. At Davis, we made FIRST history by winning the Imagery Award for the second year in a row, and we also won the Pit Safety Award. Although our robot did the best it could have done, we were not able to make it to playoffs. In Idaho, we won the Gracious Professionalism award and made it into the 8th seated alliance. This was a great end to our season.
Year Four
This has been our best season yet. Our team hit the ground running this year, with a very busy and productive off-season. We gained a significant amount of members, and a large group of promising and dedicated Freshmen, which we assigned to VEX for the fall season. We sent four teams to participate in VEX In the Zone, one of which made it to regional playoffs. The members of the VEX teams have since been integrated into our FRC program and have been working with the team to complete this year's robot. In the off-season, the team completed a long-standing goal of hosting a FIRST LEGO League tournament. A few students and our head mentor coordinated and executed the tournament, and we plan to continue hosting it in subsequent years. Since the beginning of build season, the team has been working tirelessly to design and complete an excellent robot in just three weeks. We were given the incredible opportunity to rent a large, vacant building in the same parking lot as our school. The team thoroughly enjoyed having a workshop to work out of rather than a storage container, and we were also able to convert part of the building into a practice field where all teams in our area were able to practice with their robot. We performed excellently at the Sacramento Regional Competition, leading the fifth seed alliance as captains in the playoffs and making it to semi-finals, where we lost to the first-seeded alliance which contained the top two teams at the competition. We went into the Idaho Regional Competition feeling proud of our robot and our team. We lead the fifth seed alliance as captains in the playoffs at that regional as well, and took home our third Imagery Award. We were offered a spot at World Championships in Houston for the second year in a row, and we are thrilled to be attending. The RoboKnights are excited for the rest of the season and what it has to offer.
Year Five
The Robo Knights have started the off the year successfully.