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West Nottingham Rams held their first VEX Robotics Competition at West Nottingham Academy on December 14th.

15 teams from all over Delmarva came from as far away as Salisbury MD to run in an early season event.

Qualification Rankings

Rank	Team	Name	Wins	Losses	Ties	WPs	APs	SPs
1	3389C	TEC-Tigers	8	2	0	16	39	90
2	3389D	TEC-Tigers	7	3	0	14	48	78
3	97963T	JC Patriots	7	3	0	14	45	96
4	3389F	Tec-Tigers	7	3	0	14	36	97
5	8903A	MPHS A	7	3	0	14	24	84
6	3389E	Tec-Tigers	6	3	1	13	39	91
7	7135D	Loyola Robotics	5	4	1	11	30	105
8	28724R	WNA Azimuth	5	5	0	10	15	100
9	7135G	Loyola Robotics	4	5	1	9	33	86
10	97963B	JC Patriots	4	5	1	9	30	92
11	3389A	TEC-Tigers	4	6	0	8	30	52
12	3389B	TEC-Tigers	4	6	0	8	27	59
13	7135E	Loyola Robotics	3	7	0	6	18	60
14	28724A	WNA PowerPuff	1	9	0	2	21	54
15	28724X	WNA International Labor	1	9	0	2	12	53

Awards
Excellence Award 3389E Tec-Tigers Wicomico County Robotics Club
Tournament Champions 3389D TEC-Tigers Wicomico County Robotics Club
Tournament Champions 3389F Tec-Tigers Wicomico County Robotics Club
Design Award 3389F Tec-Tigers Wicomico County Robotics Club
Judges Award 7135D Loyola Robotics Loyola Blakefield
Robot Skills Champion 8903A MPHS A Mount Pleasant High School

Mount Pleasant High School held the first Delmarva “Tower Takeover” event.

Thank you to all of the teams that participated. We’d like to take a moment to thank all of the volunteers that helped to make this tournament a success. Thank you to JROTC for supplying 10 cadets to help things run smoothly. They are always ready to help and very organized. Thank you to Springer Middle School for providing volunteers. Thank you to Joan and Jay Cotton. They helped to coordinate the whole tournament with concessions. Thank you to Jason Heller and John Cain for being refs. MPHS couldn’t have done this without all of the help that we received.

Qualification Results

Rank	Team	Name	Wins	Losses	Ties	WPs	APs	SPs
1	1274B	Igneous Robotics	7	1	0	14	24	38
2	6967A	Aluminum Allies	7	1	0	14	18	54
3	3389B	TEC-Tigers	6	2	0	12	24	46
4	90967D	Springer D	6	2	0	12	21	54
5	90967C	Springer C	5	2	1	11	21	51
6	8903A	MPHS A	5	3	0	10	36	33
7	90967B	Springer B	5	3	0	10	27	41
8	3389F	Tec-Tigers	4	3	1	9	24	36
9	65101A	Sanford School	4	4	0	8	21	48
10	62816A	Brandywine	3	4	1	7	27	59
11	90967A	Springer A	3	4	1	7	18	47
12	3389C	TEC-Tigers	2	4	2	6	15	46
13	3389D	TEC-Tigers	2	5	1	5	6	48
14	3389E	Tec-Tigers	2	6	0	4	18	41
15	17258B	Brandywine	2	6	0	4	9	39
16	8903C	MPHS C	1	6	1	3	21	29
17	8903D	MPHS D	1	7	0	2	12	20

Awards

Excellence Award: 3389C TEC-Tigers Wicomico County Robotics Club
Design Award: 3389F Tec-Tigers Wicomico County Robotics Club
Tournament Champions: 1274B Igneous Robotics Igneous Robotics
Tournament Champions: 6967A WatchMojo Caesar Rodney High School
Tournament Finalists: 90967D The Vultures Springer Middle School
Tournament Finalists: 3389C TEC-Tigers Wicomico County Robotics Club

There is a workshop scheduled for 26 of October for all Mentors and Roboteers. This is a chance to get caught up on the latest for the 2019-20 season and meet other teams from Delmarva.

Parkside High School – 1015 Beaglin Park Dr., Salisbury, MD 21804 from 9:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m

Agenda:
9:00 a.m. – Doors open/Check-in
9:15 a.m. – 9:30 a.m. – Introduction
9:30 a.m. – 11:30 a.m. – Content specific instruction
11:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m. – Lunch
12:30 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. – Robot building troubleshooting/challenge
3:30 p.m. – 4:00 p.m. – Certificates/Closing remarks

There is a guest speaker planned from NASA.

For more info see the robot events invitation or contact Jenny Miles at jmiles@wcboe.org

Schools are about to start and across Delmarva, that means that the rest of the robot teams are starting to spin up. A number of groups have met across the summer and there have been some summer camps.

This really good article about Squared Away covers some strategy details that will give some roboteers a running start on the season.

Every year, for every competition game, VEX designs a “Hero-bot”, a design that can play the basic game. The robot for Squared Away – Clutch looks the same as past years robots. A two motor, 4 wheel drive base, backbone, 4 bar linkage arm and a claw. This year the claw faces down to make it easy to manage the cubes. This year there is a height restriction on the robots, Clutch is able to stay under the line by the use of some pegs to keep the arm from moving too high.

Both the insights from Summer Camp and Clutch should give teams a running start for the 2019-2020 season.

The 2019-2020 season qualifying criteria is available!

VRC Qualifying Criteria 2019-2020 can be downloaded. There are some important changes. Key this year has to do with the addition of new divisions. This means that Delmarva can send 3 teams from High School (same as last year) but now can send 3 teams from Middle School. This means for both groups the Excellence Award and Tournament Winners are eligible to go to Worlds!

The VEXIQ Qualifying Criteria 2019 shows the changes from last year. There is no change in the number of slots from 3 at the Elementary School level (Excellence and Tournament Winners) and the Middle School single Excellence Award winner.

If you are part of a VEX University team this years VEX U Qualifying Criteria is a must read. Changes to parts and what you can print this year are very important.

There are other things to be aware of, so take a quick read of the documents.

Event Partners are the people that run the events in Delmarva. The annual Event Partner meeting was held on 13 August at Polytech High School in Camden Delaware. There were 11 partners present. The meeting was run by Dan Troy our local Regional Support Manager.

Last year had some good stats on the overall VEX programs

2018-2019	240,000 Roboteers
	24,000 Teams
	25,000 Events
	60+ Countries

And we did pretty well in Delmarva

VIQ Elementary School	33
VIQ Middle School	9
VRC Middle School	27
VRC High School	35

Grants
There is the possibility of grants this year:
Trailer Grants – there are two forms of this. First is a combination of a 15′ trailer, 4 fields, 4 elements, 4 displays, 4 Raspberry Pi, cables, routers, extension cords. This will require the recipient to prove insurance coverage on the trailer and proof that they have a vehicle that can tow it.

Second trailer is just the components, event partner will need to supply the trailer (or their own transportation)

Dan will check on if there is a similar version for VEX IQ (shooting for 6 fields)

Worlds Updates
2020 World Championship will be in Louisville KY. In 2021 the championship will move to Houston TX (2021-2024)

At the 2020 Championship the number of divisions will grow by 2. This will allow ~160 more teams to go to Worlds

New updates to the Code of Conduct will state that outside activity of roboteers will be counted during judging and egregious activity (hate mail to RECF staff as an example)

Referee Training
Referee Training is available on line. RECF is mandating the Head Referee take the training and be qualified. They may suggest that for Regional events that are Worlds Qualifier that all referees be qualified. Training is simple takes 20-30 minutes to do. https://certifications.vex.com You will need to create a new sign on to get into the testing. (Your VEX sign on does not carry over

Tournament Manager will have a link to the qualification data base so EP’s can check on the status of the certification.

Judging
The pilot program on returning judges comments that Foster ran in the 2018-2019 season. RECF has decided to put this on the back burner for 2019-20

RECF is suggesting that all teams should be interviewed by the judges. Interviews are to be done in the pits. Notebook judging and discussions should be done in a closed room. Judged awards should be decided by judges only (not EP) after the last qualifying match.

There is a new Volunteer management system to make it easier to help track what people are doing for you.

New rubric for this season with more categories, points are now 1-5, and you don’t need to award any points. This should make scoring the teams easier. There is now a 5 point bonus for having a bound notebook.

Other topics
STEM Research project to come out on August 15. It’s not required at all IQ events, but will be at the Regional Championship. They are working on a way to collect the video submissions.

For the 2020-21 the VEXIQ field will be increased from 4’x8′ to 6’x8′.

RoboticsEducation.org will be changing, so if you have deep links they will no longer work.

They are adding new resources for people to use. Check out their new STEM Labs portal! https://education.vex.com/

Squared Away

The size of the robot IS DIFFERENT THIS YEAR. Robots are now measured from the inside the wall. If you played last years game you have the parts to make this years sizing tool follow these instructions, if not this sizing tool is for sale

If you build Clutch, if you build it incorrectly it will be too tall to play the game.

Tower Takeover
Scoring in this game is complex, and it’s recommended that you get one of the scoring apps.

Unlimited expansion! Wall Bots are now legal!!

Raspberry Pi
Support for events using Raspberry Pi’s has gotten much better. Teams in Delmarva that want to use Raspberry Pi should contact our RSM – Dan or Foster from STEM Robotics for help. Foster has 9 Raspberry Pi’s and small monitors for field displays. VEX is looking at releasing LED “Hats” to allow LED lighting around the field perimeters that is controlled by the Raspberry Pi

REMEMBER TO PUT YOUR EVENTS IN ROBOT EVENTS!

It’s almost time for school!

https://education.vex.com/

VEX Robotics created STEM Labs as a supplemental educational resource. The purpose was to support educators with free, easy to follow STEM lesson plans that align with educational standards. Each STEM Lab contains hands-on lessons with guided explorations that encourage teamwork and collaboration.

There are both EDR and VIQ lessons, and lessons are also broken out by age levels. This is a great resource if you are looking for ways to build your team’s skills or if you want to improve your individual skills.

The games for 2019-2020 were released at the end of the Worlds Championship. There are two exciting games this season

VEX IQ – Squared Away

The scoring objects in VEX IQ Challenge Squared Away are 3” diameter Balls and 7” Cubes. There are a total of (35) Balls and (7) Cubes on the field. The object of the game is to score as many points as possible with your alliance partner in one of two ways: by scoring Balls in or on Cubes, and by moving Cubes to their respective Scoring Zones.

Squared Away Game Manual

Squared Away Game Video

VEX VRC – Tower Takeover

There are sixty-six 66 Cubes on a Tower Takeover Field. Twenty-two (22) Green, twenty-two (22) Orange and, twenty-two (22) Purple. There are also seven (7) Towers placed around the field. Five (5) of these are neutral, with the remaining two being alliance specific. Alliance specific Towers may only be utilized by robots of the same alliance.

Cubes can be Placed in Towers, or Scored in Goals. Cubes are worth at least 1 point when Placed in a Goal Zone. The exact value of each cube is determined by how many Cubes of that specific color have been Placed in Towers. When Cubes are Placed in or removed from Towers, the new values apply to ALL cubes. So the actions of one Robot will impact the potential score for both their own alliance, and their opponents.

The alliance that scores more points in the Autonomous period is awarded with (6) bonus points, added to the final score at the end of the match. The Alliance who wins this Autonomous Bonus is also awarded 2 purple cubes, which may be introduced at any time during the driver control period.

Tower Takeover Game Manual

Tower Takeover Game Video

In the VRC side, only two teams from Delmarva were able to make it to Worlds High School event.

3389E Tec-Tigers Wicomico County Robotics Club

3389C TEC-Tigers Wicomico County Robotics Club

3389C Placed 175 out of 305 for skills, they placed 64th out of 96. The 3389E robot placed 84th out of 96 in their division

On the VIQ side:

23B Claymont Boeing Claymont Elementary

23T Claymont Tesla Claymont Elementary

19968E HOB Vikings Robotics H. O. Brittingham Elementary School
played in the elementary tournament. Claymont Boeing had a great event, they were ranked 24th in their division. Sadly they missed the top 22 team playoff by 2 points. H. O. Brittingham and Claymont Tesla didn’t fare as well, they were both in the bottom 25%.

In the middle school tournament

50100A Dark Side Robotics Dark Side Robotics

Dark Side had lots of fun but ended up 64 out of 82.

National Robotics Week (RoboWeek) is a series of grassroots events and activities during the month of April aimed at increasing public awareness of the strength and importance of the U.S. robotics industry and of the tremendous social and cultural impact that robotics will have on the future. Activities come in all shapes and sizes from a robot block party, university open house, or a robotics competition. The mission of RoboWeek is simple — to inspire students in STEM-related fields and to share the excitement of robotics with audiences of all ages.

This year National Robotics week this year is April 6-14/

https://www.nationalroboticsweek.org/

Do something robotics this week!