High school students battle with robot creations

Students from three schools around the valley used their weekend to divide and conquer.

On Nov. 17, students from Palo Verde, Centennial and Las Vegas high schools met to scrimmage with robots they made in their respective science classes.

Led by Ceyril Paulus, the robotics teacher at Palo Verde, the group met at the Summerlin high school, 333 Pavilion Center Drive, to test their mettle.

"I think it's pretty cool that you get to build robots and go to other schools," said Las Vegas High School freshman Alejandro Marin.

The students actually are preparing for a regional competition in December, and practice runs like these are aimed at helping them see what does and does not work with their robotic creations.

"We had problems with our arm last year," Palo Verde senior Katelyn Orr said. "It was a good concept, but we had to simplify things."

Stationed in a quad on the Palo Verde campus, students congregated around the robots' arena and cheered for their team's model, while others worked on their designs right up until they were called to battle.

Las Vegas High School senior Kristie Gaff, Alejandro's partner, said her group came to Palo Verde to see how the ring would be set up and to see what they needed to modify on their robot.

"Ours isn't fast, it just has to be a bulldozer," Gaff said.

Once in the ring, students had to use a remote control to manipulate their robots, utilizing radio frequencies to send the signal.

The object of the matches was to move discs from one side of the goal to the other and prevent the other teams from doing the same.

At any given time, a robot could be practicing offense and then quickly be required to switch to defensive mode, much like any sport.

In addition to the students from Centennial, Las Vegas and Palo Verde, Bonanza High School robotics teacher Michael Harrison came out to see how other schools' robots worked and to get ideas for his program, which is just getting off the ground.

"I wanted to record this to show my students so they can see what it's all about," Harrison said.