On Thursday, October 24th, 2013, the West Bloomfield High School’s (WBHS) Robotics team started off their Oakland County Competitive Robotic Association (OCCRA) season. During their competition on October 24^th, the team won one, tied one and lost two of their four battles. Captain, Alexis Canella, a senior, states, “it was a big step for us.” The design of their robot is based off a dump truck, where it hangs and scores by dropping balls into a grid. OCCRA is the robotic competition for all Oakland County schools. It lasts from September to December. The next competition is FIRSTS, which is a national and world wide competition, where WBHS will compete against all the schools from Michigan. Senior and first year team member, Chris Chiaravalli, build team, states, “at first we were a little be behind, but now we’ve got a working robot and it seems to do pretty well.”

For OCCRA there is a large diversity in the competitions. There are male, female, and adult driver times. Sophomore, Alexis Ball, Co Captain, says, “It helped widen my creativity and was a good experience to create different things.” WBHS’ Robotics Team was one of the first teams to join OCCRA, while for FIRSTS, they just joined last year. Junior, Brendan Gimby, a programmer, adds, “We are doing pretty well considering the little funds we have, and we work well together.

During this season’s competition for OCCRA, the team made a robot that can lift itself up on a bar through a motor system that attaches to the base and drops balls or stops other teams from dropping balls into a grid through a race, naming it Odin the Robot. Each competition (race), lasts about two minutes to get as many points as possible. The WBHS team meets every school day from after school until 4:00 pm. This is where they build, design, and practice.  During their meetings they split up into separate groups, because everyone on the team has a different job or role that helps to contribute. Senior, Ryan Bloom,  Co Build Captain, states, “It is a lot of fun, but a lot of hard work.”

The Robotics coaches are Mr. Francis Muylaert and Mrs. Loebl. Muylaert states that it is “a pretty confident team, they’re doing well and they did a great job on their bot.”

The WBHS Robotics Team had another OCCRA competition recently, on Saturday, November 2^nd, and have many more coming up throughout November.  This competition scores consisted  of two wins for the girls, 16 to 5 and another 11-0. The team was  extremely pumped, positive and had a blast doing the things they love. There was a total of 25 schools at this competition and for every race there are four schools that compete at a time. Usually there are 4 matches; on Saturday, November second, they had two female, one co-ed, one adult and  two male competitions. At the end of the competitions there are awards, such as most beautiful bot, most spirited and more. “It was a really fun way of spending my Saturday instead of staying home and doing my homework,” states Alexis Ball. Great job WBHS Robotics, continue to work prosperously.