The world of robotics is constantly changing and growing especially at Elkhorn North. The Elkhorn North robotics club began with 12 students when the school was first established in 2020 ,though it has now grown to a whopping 64 students. For a fee of $40 which includes a team t-shirt and pizza at all competitions, this club draws students interested in the world of programming and engineering.

Every year a new competition is announced at the Vex Robotics World Championship in May and students build and prepare over the summer. The competition changes every year to encourage students to think outside the box and learn new skills. This year the competition is called “High Stakes.”

In competition, members are assigned to partner with a team of people from a random school making competition stressful. With only a few minutes to discuss strategy before a match, the team that you are paired with is very important.

“Sometimes we are paired with teams that can’t score and sometimes you get put with a team that’s already qualified for state,” junior, Zane Larson said.

Before each match teams are split into a blue and red group with two robots on each.

Red and blue plastic donuts are set up around the playing field as well as small movable podiums. The goal of the competition this year is to grab a podium and donuts and stack as many donuts of your color as you can on top of a podium. When time runs out whichever team has the most points wins.

“There’s this big ladder in the middle that you can climb at the end of the match for bonus points, which is super hard to make a heavy robot do,” club sponsor and math teacher Chris
Peters said.

The team of Carter Theis, Zane Larson, Sai Smaran Arevetti, Tansi Praveen, and Michael Carlson earned a spot at state in their last competition, though they hope to gain a better seed at their next competition. Theis is the primary builder for the team, Arevetti is the programmer, Praveen is in charge of notetaking, and Carlson helps out everywhere. Larson drives the bot for the team and says that it can get difficult during hard matches.

“If the game is close it can get super stressful and things can definitely go wrong,” said Larson.

The first 15 seconds of a match are dedicated to preprogrammed driving so it is the role of the programmer to make sure the bot is capable of doing that before the competition.

“In the first 15 seconds of the game it is autonomous, so all by the robot, which is my job,” junior programmer, Sai Smaran Arievetti said.

With how many members are in the club and how many bots they have, not every team will be able to compete every time so it is important to Peters that everyone gets a chance.

“Every tournament has a limit of how many teams you can bring, soI just try to cycle them in, I try to give teams equal opportunities,” Peters said.

Since each team within the club is responsible for the construction of their own robot, some are more prepared than others and compete more.

“If you are really slow to build, dragging your feet a lot, it takes a long time for you to get ready, then you might not get as many opportunities as Zane or Sai’s team who have been ready since July,” Peters said.

With a competition that requires a lot of mental focus and good teamwork, it is important to Peters that members get along and cooperate.

“We have a great culture here, any bad blood that pops up between teenagers we try to put that out as fast as we can.” Peters said.

Obviously building tons of robots can be expensive. The main source of funding for the program comes from grants from the Public Schools Foundation. Like over clubs they also gain funding from working concessions for Elkhorn North events.

“We work football concessions whenever we can. I’m refreshing my email like crazy in August trying to get that homecoming game,” Peters said.

The members of the Elkhorn North Robotics club work hard and deserve the success they have received these past years. Members that put in that work deserve celebration especially as they go off to state.