M’CHIGEENG—The Manitoulin Secondary School (MSS) Mustangs First Team 6865 (Rookies) team had a great deal of fun and brought home two awards as participants in the 2018 First Robotics Competition.
“It was really fun,” stated MSS Student Success Teacher Allan Davy, who is lead mentor for the MSS team this past Sunday evening. “We also won two awards at the competition, (held at Georgian College last weekend).”
“Now we have a fully functional robot, something we couldn’t say three days ago,” said Mr. Davy. Prior to the competition, “some elements of the robot were working and some weren’t but now all things are working; we can now use a joystick and move our robot around like you would on a video game.” Mr. Davy pointed out all this came together about three minutes before the MSS first game of the tournament.
The MSS team won two awards at the competition, “the Rookie Inspiration Award” for a team that defies all odds to compete (those being geographically from a small area and school, with a lack of some resources and access to parts and equipment for the robot and limited sponsorship). The Mustangs also won the Being a Rookie Team Award for being a successful rookie team.
The MSS First Team 6865 team includes co-captains Doug Robinson and JD Herlehy, safety captain Dillon Dunlop, media Sandi Kuntsi and graphic design Emily Savage.
Before its next competition, to be held in North Bay the last weekend in March, “we will be making a couple of changes to our robot,” Mr. Davy told the Recorder. “We will be making a couple of upgrades and modifications to a couple of our (robot) bumpers so we can make a quick transformation from being part of the red or blue alliance teams at the competition.”
There were over 32 teams taking part in this past weekend’s district meet.
Mr. Davy noted the MSS team with its upcoming competition ahead of them, “are still looking for sponsors to help the team out.”
