St. Andrew’s students win multiple trophies at the Robotics World Championship in Dallas

JACKSON, Miss. (WLBT) – You may have played a sport in high school, but did you ever compete in a robotics competition? That’s exactly what five students from St. Andrew’s Episcopal School have been able to do this year.

Ninth and tenth-grade students Patrick, Suraj, Rohan, Senyo, and Lucy teamed up this school year to perfect their robot.

“Starting in October, we decided to plan, research, and observe. We started off pretty quickly and so far this year, we’ve had four iterations,” freshman team member Patrick Lui, said

So, what was their robot supposed to do? In simple terms, it plays its own version of soccer with pyramid-shaped balls and lifts itself up.

Making that happen was no small task.

“For our first robot, we thought it was too big, and it was too slow. So we have to change it to our new robot, which is faster, and it has a new improved thing,” freshman team member Senyo Dzathor, said.

Their goal was to compete in as many competitions as possible to reach the ultimate challenge: the 2024 VEX Robotics World Championship in Dallas.

“The one thing we’re going there to do is win,” Suraj said. “You know, represent our school, Mississippi, whatever tournament we’re going to whether it’s like district, world, nationals, something big like that,” freshman team member Suraj Ramarao explained.

After qualifying at a state tournament, that goal was quickly becoming a reality.

“Walking in Worlds, at first, it was it was very overwhelming. But it was also it was really great to see, you know, people from all across the world,” sophomore team member Lucy Stevens said.

Students from China, Mexico, Switzerland, and more put their robots to the test against Andy. Out of 10 games, Andy won four.

That’s something not many first-time participants can brag about.

“Getting a win would give us more confidence to like, keep going and keep changing. And even though we lost, it’s still showed us we still need to maybe change something and then we can grow higher and higher in the ranks,” freshman team member Rohan Anand explained.

With their trophies on display at school, the students are ready to keep their foot on the gas and take home the grand prize next year.

“Just learning from them seeing how hard they work and just inspired to be like that,” Lui said.

“My team is so smart. I’m so lucky to have such smart people to accomplish such great things with,” Stevens explained.

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