Selbyville Middle robotics to go to world championships – Delmarva Daily Times

Three students from Selbyville Middle School will be going to the VEX World Robotics Competition in Louisville, Kentucky from April 19 through April 25. Produced by Megan Raymond

The Selbyville Middle school Robotics Team practices on Thursday, March 30, 2017.(Photo: Staff Photo by Megan Raymond)Buy Photo

A steel robot is making a buzz around Selbyville Middle School.

This robot is designed to pick up items with its front-facing claw, move like a NASA Mars rover and get the item over a fence.

But this robot has not been constructed by a team at NASA or a university.

This robot was designed by sixth-graders Kaitlyn Johnson and Evan Carpenter and seventh-grader Kendall Coleman,three students at Selbyville Middle Schooland will be taking them to Louisville, Kentucky, to compete in theVEX Worlds competition from April 19-25.

"We get competitive with the other teams," Johnson said. "It's a lot of fun."

The robots created entirely by the students must be able to knock foam stars off a fence and get a cube onto the other side of a 3-foot fence that divides the arena.

The trio has made several robots this year, but this is the one that has brought them the most success and they designed it in less than four hours, Coleman said.

"We took our previous design apart," she said. "We then found out we had a competition the next weekend, and we had nothing whatsoever. We put this together, and then we got tournament champion that day."

To their knowledge, Colemansaid her team's robot is the only one made by middle school students in the state of Delaware that can get the cube to the other side.

This isn't Coleman's first time going to the world competition, nor is it the first time for Jonathan Casto, one of the two Selbyville Middle robotics coaches.

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Kaitlyn Johnson,6th, Evan Carpenter,6th, Kendall Coleman, 7th, Selbyville Middle school Robotics team has won the right to compete at the world robotics championship in Kentucky.(Photo: Staff Photo by Megan Raymond)

Since Casto started teaching technical education at Selbyville Middle School three years ago, he has sent a robotics team to the world championship each year.

It is the learning environment of the school that enables the teams to excel so often, Casto said.

"Also, parental support is huge," Casto said. "With our fundraising efforts right now, we have so many parents that are involved and taking a very active role, not just with fundraising, but they are here during practice, they help set up for us, they come to all of our competitions. I really think parental support has a lot to do with it."

Tommie Morrison, a teacher at Selbyville Middle School, came to the team partway through the year.

She said she has been impressed with what she has seen, and the team always works hard.

"We practice two times a week, so we put in the extra time and we put in the weekend time," she said. "Sometimes we leave at 6 a.m. and we dont get back until 6 p.m., so theyre long days and the kids are willing to do it. They are really committed, and that is one thing I have been impressed with."

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Kaitlyn Johnson, Selbyville Middle school Robotics team member practices on Thursday, March 30, 2017.(Photo: Staff Photo by Megan Raymond)

The team that is going to the world championship works very well together, Casto added.

He said the team members complement each other and they get together on weekends.

"They will take the robot home with them and they continue to work on it out of school," Castosaid. "They are all strong academically, and they all have strong parental support."

Morrison agreed, and said the team works so well together becauseColeman and Johnson are very detail-orientedand Carpenter is the glue that holds the group together.

As for the team members, they said they are going to enjoy their time together going to the championships.

"We are just ecstatic we have been given the honor to represent our school and our state," Johnson said.

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Selbyville Middle robotics to go to world championships - Delmarva Daily Times