Photo by Russ Kelemen

Photo by Russ Kelemen

The Dallas BEST Regional Robotics Competition was held on Saturday, Oct. 18 at Eastfield College, which ended in two teams from a pool of 24 in the Dallas area advancing to state competition: Woodrow Wilson High School and St. Mark’s School of Texas.

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If you’re unfamiliar with the Woodrow Wilson Robocats team, check out this story freelance blogger Will Maddox wrote for Advocate last year.

Woodrow superfan Kyle Rains says Woodrow’s overall finish was above St. Mark’s. In a previous competition, Woodrow placed ahead of Hockaday.

“There are two ranking systems and the overall ranking includes the team’s marketing, record keeping lab books showing their design process and other things,” says Woodrow’s UT Dallas sponsor Marc Hairston.

Woodrow STEM Academy head Brandon Carver says the students have spent six weeks “designing, building, and testing a robot that could perform several different complex tasks,” and the resulting robot “did a tremendous job representing Woodrow at the competition,” he says.

“This is a crew that works incredibly hard, but never seeks the spotlight. They have earned some recognition.”

Carver also won an outstanding teacher award at the competition, based on a  letter of recommendation submitted by the Woodrow’s club president, Joey Hines.