Members of Columbus’ GalacTech robotics team ready their robot for competition at IndyRAGE on Oct. 21 at Perry Meridian High School in Indianapolis.
Photo provided by FIRST Indiana Robotics
A local high school robotics team is gearing up for its next season after competing at two offseason tournaments.
Team 4926, also known as GalacTech, competed in the Boiler Bot Battle at Tippecanoe County Fairgrounds on Oct. 14, along with about 30 other For the Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST) Robotics Competition teams from Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky and New Hampshire.
Members of GalacTech also competed at IndyRAGE (Raising Awareness for Girls in Engineering) on Oct. 21. The event, which was held at Perry Meridian High School in Indianapolis, is focused on promoting women in STEM.
Columbus Robotics president and Team 4926 founder Sam Geckler said that these kinds of events provide a chance for students to step into different roles than they’re used to.
“The view from behind the glass, as we like to say, is very different from the view in the pits or in the stands,” he said. “And so these kinds of events open up those opportunities for a lot of other students. And what I like to see is, these events come with their ups and downs, their failures and successes, like a regular season event. And so I get an opportunity, all of the mentors for the team too, to see how students handle those challenges.”
GalacTech ranked ninth during qualification matches at Boiler Bot Battle and captained a sixth-seed alliance in the event playoffs, working alongside the RoboBlazers from Carmel and Ctrl-Z from Champaign, Ill.
While their alliance did not win, Geckler said it was probably “the greatest alliance selection we’ve ever done”, as the RoboBlazers were part of the alliance that won the 2023 state championship, and Ctrl-Z was part of the alliance that won the 2023 international FIRST Championship for FRC.
Students then headed to IndyRAGE the following weekend.
“The goal is to have as much participation from females as possible, so they ask that the drive team members be female,” Geckler said. “…We took four ladies from our team. Actually, we’re a little bit low on female participation compared to previous years. But three of those were from our high school FRC team, and actually we had one participant from our FIRST Tech Challenge teams, which was a middle school student, participating with us. And then we had several of our male students go. It was a relatively small contingent overall.”
GalacTech was part of the eighth-seed alliance in the IndyRAGE playoffs but did not win at this event either, Geckler said.
Still, he was pleased with students’ performance at both tournaments.
“You know, this robot’s getting a little tired and it wasn’t exactly our best robot ever, so I wasn’t particularly happy with it, but I felt the students did a great job,” he said.
During their 2023 season, GalacTech made it to the state championship but did not qualify to advance to the international FIRST Championship.
Both IndyRAGE and Boiler Bot Battle featured a reprise of the 2023 FRC challenge, “Charged Up.”
The game, presented by the Gene Haas Foundation, involves moving cubes and cones into areas referred to as “grids” so that teams can score points and “charge up their community”, as FIRST put it in an explanatory video. Teams also score points by moving their robots onto a teeter-totter platform known as the “charge station.”
With competitions at an end, the team is preparing for 2024, Geckler said. This includes conducting computer-aided design training sessions, building new practice chassis, cleaning up their workshop, adding new tools and teaching students how to use these items.
The team also participates in outreach events, such as the Bartholomew Consolidated School Corp.’s recent Girl Up! night.
GalacTech’s next season will officially kick off in January with the reveal of the new FRC game.
According to FIRST, “In CRESCENDO presented by Haas, a new challenge debuting January 6, 2024, FIRST Robotics Competition teams will use their engineering skills and creative power to entertain and move the world.”
“We’re all excited to be done with the current challenge,” Geckler said. “And of course, we have no idea what the next one’s going to be, so speculation begins.”
He added that the team will be hosting a competition at Columbus East High School in March.
Columbus Robotics is always looking for new students for its middle and high school teams, as well as mentors, he said.
About Team 4926
Team 4926, or GalacTech, is Columbus Robotics’ FIRST Robotics Competition team.
Bartholomew Consolidated School Corp. high school students in grades 9-12 with an interest in STEM programs are encouraged to join the team.
FIRST introduced the FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) in 1992. Each year FRC unveils a new challenge at Kickoff in January. High school students work with professional mentors to solve the engineering design problem, then work with other teams in alliances to play the game at competition events where they are also judged on design, innovation and culture changing behavior.
To learn more about the local team, visit facebook.com/Team4926/ and team4926.org. Individuals interested in joining one of Columbus Robotics’ teams can email [email protected] for more information.
