When a student walks into physics teacher, Andrea Strock’s, fifth hour robotics class, several attentive peers are tinkering with robot parts. This is her one, and only, period she teaches a topic other than physics — fifth hour she teaches robotics. Students collaborate to surpass challenges as the Sonoran Storm robotics team. These practicing engineers have been perfecting their craft, some since the club started in 2013, by competing at various competitions against other teams in Arizona.

This time of year, robotics students have just met their deadline for their first robot that will compete in the FIRST© Robotics Competition (FRC). FRC announced a medieval theme for the 2016 competition: FIRST Stronghold.

The goal of this competition is to take a dodge ball and throw it at the opponent’s tower into goals around the tower both high and low. Senior Leann Scott describes incorporating the theme as, “over time that will destroy the tower and eventually we can capture it.” Capturing the tower requires eight boulders (dodge balls) to thrust into an opening in the tower, as well as each of the three robots on the alliance to gather around the tower, facing each one of the three sides.

FRC heavily emphasizes the problem solving and building aspects of engineering. Beyond designing these robots and preparing them to compete against a multitude of schools, the robotics class also tackles competitions that address the business and design aspects of engineering.

One of these competitions is F1 in Schools competition where the class broke up into five teams. The first team, Seismic, led by senior Dayna Miller, won second place in the F1 in Schools state competition for Arizona, and the Four Horsemen, led by junior Cody McMahon, placed third.

The F1 in Schools competition requires students to be in a team of three to six people, create a business plan, portfolio, pit display, five-minute presentation, and fundraise to pay for all materials used by the team.

Their success at the competition qualifies them for the F1 in Schools U.S./Canada National Competition in Michigan from May 13 to May 15. Team Four Horsemen qualified for nationals through their racing timings and team Seismic qualified for nationals through their business plan and portfolio.

Robotics club advisor Andrea Strock shares the excitement for the national competition. “Right now we are refining. We are working on the cars to go faster and cleaning up their business plans and portfolios.”

The hard work and tedious hours perfecting their technology makes robotics a major part of the STEM program. “This is the first year we have seniors and we are one of the few schools in the state to have a robotics class,” Principal Dan Serrano continues, “we are putting emphasis on it financially, because students are taking it seriously.”

In addition to students preparing for the national competition, the team is helping to mentor middle school and junior high students before high school at Santan and Payne junior high as well as CTA Liberty elementary.

Sophomore Casey McMahon started the mentoring program to popularize STEM in order to “have opportunities in STEM education prior to high school and get them involved, especially in middle school. In high school, they can work their way up.”