18 FEBRUARY 2024 By Mark Hays Following a triumphant win at the First Lego League regional tournament, Echo Canyon’s robotics team – also known as The Roarbots – competed in a State Championship emphasizing teamwork, robotics, skills and dedication. The genesis of the tournaments came in 2019 when teacher Kay King founded Echo Canyon Robotics. This year’s team has nine students in fourth, fifth and sixth grade – and King said that a positive attitude is behind everything they do. “Our team is enthusiastic and spirited,” she said. “We work hard and have fun.” The Roarbots create the basic design of their robot, and it’s evolved each year to do tasks on a 4’x8’ table or ‘field’ with missions made from Legos. Each mission has a task to push, pull or move levers. The robot must be programmed to do these tasks autonomously. The team’s final step to the championship was the Regional Scottsdale Qualifying Tournament in December at Saguaro High, where 12 robotics teams from Scottsdale schools participated. “Lego asks each team to develop an innovative project that goes along with the theme,” King said. “This year, the task was to make other people’ love your hobby as much as you do.’” For this exercise, the Roarbots – with help from SUSD IT technician Christopher Constantini – chose to make an immersive slime booth where people could see, hear, touch, smell, and taste edible slime. The booth was a big hit, as the team placed first in the robot matches with a high score of 240 points. The club also received additional recognition, winning the Champions Award for excelling in “Innovative Project, Core Values, and Robot Design.” The top three teams were invited to the State Championship, which was held at ASU on January 13. Almost 50 teams from around Arizona competed. “Our robot score was good for regionals but needed to improve for State,” King said. “We worked on programming our robot to achieve a higher score.” Students Aria Scordo and Delilah Tobey said that their favorite parts of being on the team are building with Legos and having fun with the team. Fellow student Jonah Gross agreed: “I wanted to join robotics so I would have something fun to do after school that let me collaborate with others and learn programming,” Jonah said. At the Arizona State First Lego League Championships, the team won the Breakthrough Award, a trophy awarded to the school that made the most progress in both the competition and Innovation Project, and exemplified the core values of the tournament. The Roarbots placed 16th out of 54. Teamwork and tech bring victory to Echo Canyon Roarbots The Echo Canyon Roarbots: (back) Chloe Wilkins, Emme Burton, Aria Scordo, Chloe Kane, Delilah Tobey, Aideen Ray. (front): Jonah Gross, Andrew Ventura Pulido, Miles Rogers. PHOTO: KAY KING YOUR LANDSCAPE EXPERTS SERVING ARCADIA AND SURROUNDING AREAS FOR OVER 10 YEARS. CALL 480-549-0590 FOR A COMPLIMENTARY CONSULTATION! ROC #313230 Licensed I Bonded I Insured Member of AZ Landscape Contractors Association Your Personal Landscape Experts atoztreeandturf.com PRO TIP: IT’S TIME TO FERTILIZE CITRUS! To promote healthy trees and delicious fruit, we recommend fertilizing citrus on a schedule! We follow the AZ CoOp Extension Guidelines to fertilize your fruiting trees three times a year. To help combat yellow leaves, lack of growth and underdeveloped fruit set up a citrus fertilization regimen with us! A to Z Tree & Turf designs, builds and maintains some of the most prestigious landscapes in the Valley. Our licensed and certified Plant Health Care Specialists can assess the current health of your landscape plants. We’ll formulate a detailed plan to maintain and address your landscape needs. ¥ Design - Build - Install ¥ Plant Health Care ¥ Irrigation & Lighting ¥ Artificial Turf ¥ Planting & Hardscapes ¥ Beautification & Enhancements