PHOENIX — In the world of competitive robotics, teams are tasked with programming and building robots to do certain tasks for points.
Communicating to solve problems is a necessity on the path to success.
One Valley school was able to find its place on the final podium of a recent competition without speaking a single word.
Last weekend, the Phoenix Day School for the Deaf took third place in a national robotics competition in Alabama.
Team Vogue beat out dozens of other deaf and hard-of-hearing schools to take one of the top prizes and provide some notoriety for a robotics program primed to excel in the years to come.
“It was unexpected because we’re rookies,” signed student team leader, Ducati.
Vex Robotics provides the hardware and engines that require coding and programming. During a two-minute round, several robots are put in a ring where the objective this year was to move discs or other objects for points.
Team Vogue found an edge by adding a sprocket to roll an elevated colored bar to be awarded ten points.
Video of one of the final rounds shows the key reason the team was able to secure a top finish – communication.
“There were no barriers in that competition, communication went smoothly, after the match we immediately went together in a huddle to get feedback to fix and adjust,” said Ducati.
The skills learned to build and use the robot transition to real life.
Teacher and robotics coach Dave Huber said one student asked, “what future do I have in robotics and coding?"
Huber replied: “My first thought is you can work as a Tesla mechanic. You've learned all the skills here that would be applicable to that job.”
This year’s success has PDSD’s team brainstorming on how they can improve the robot in the future or even add more robotics teams at the school.
The extracurricular activity isn’t as popular as traditional sports at PDSD and still needs funding for next year if more want to participate.
When asked what Team Vogue wants the hearing community to know about their team, Anthony, the driver of the robot said, “we can be on par with the hearing world, we can compete with the hearing people, we have the heart to compete against them, we have everything we need.”