The Shenton Robotics club students participated in their first Robocup event on 7th and 8th August at the Curtin stadium. The event was the state competition with around 90 teams from all over the state participating. We fielded 6 teams 2 for each category (Soccer, Dance, Rescue).

Rescue

Shenton Rescue 1 consisting of Robert Crew, Oscar Murat, Jimmy Ohl blitzed the competition in the qualifying rounds to be 90 points clear and ranked number 1 after 4 rounds. Each round the set up was changed with new challenges added and students had to program their robots to complete the challenges by themselves without help from teachers or adults. The students worked well together with Robert Crew leading them with some innovative coding.
Shenton Rescue 2 consisting of Wanter Wang, Aiden Feng, Mosleh Hassanein and Ryan Tan had many problems in getting their robot to comply and and on many occasion it seemed to have a mind of its own threatening to destroy the venue. The lads finished 18th and did not qualify for the finals on Saturday.

We were confident of a very competitive finals campaign on Saturday, however unfortunately overnight the robot that had 100% reliability contracted the virus that plagued Shenton Rescue 2 on Friday. We all felt the pain of Robert Crew. Well taught Felicity. The complexity of his code proved too much to correct under pressure and we ended up 8th.

Soccer

Shenton Soccer 1 consisting of Jai Castle, Thomas Moore, and Rohan Khayech, Isaac Dodd had a tough draw meeting 2 teams that ended up in the top 4 in their qualifying rounds. They lost 2 and won 1 the win coming from defeating Perth Modern. Shenton Soccer 2 consisting of Sean Yeo and Xavier Webber had an easier draw and finished 3rd after three qualifying rounds on Saturday, winning 2 and drawing one. Both their wins coming against Perth Modern and Melville. The boys were hopeful for the finals on Saturday going in prepared with alternative strategies, however an unlucky draw meant they met an all girls team that made it to the grand final and lost 5-2. Very proud of the boys and great leadership from Jai who was the spearhead in coming up with strategies and helping the boys crack the code.

Dance

The two dance teams found themselves in a tough competition from the primary students who put on an awesome display of dance and theatre.
Shenton Dance 1 comprising of Jaxon Gedes, Josh Klem, Ruby Guilfoyle, Jozef Tan, built an amazing robot that drew a lot of attention with many people just happy to stop and stare in wonder and many others requesting photos. Their performance began well and Michael Jackson signature moves drawing applause from the many parents, however when an arm dislodged it proved to be a premature end to what would have been worthy of a finals appearance. Special mention should be made of Jaxon’s efforts in programming and Isaac and Jozef’s efforts to build a robot that was an engineering feat. We will have this on display in the front office and will work on voice activation to entertain our visitors.
Shenton Dance 2 comprising of Jesse Hunt, Ashlyn Pearson, Praveen Thirunavukkarasu, Rhys Mcphail, put on a good performance, however lack of theatrical elements meant they did not score very high on the judges sheet and did not qualify for the finals.

Special thanks to co-mentor Laura Ashbolt for her contribution to the Shenton Robotics Club this year.
Thank you to Sean Hindley and Chantal Simpson for coming along and encouraging the kids and us.
As with every experience we have learnt immensely, we have grown, we are hurt and all I can say at this time to the competitors is “we will be back” in 2016. Thank you to the college community for your continued support of robotics at Shenton College.

Calvin D’Sylva
Teacher Design & Technology