The Bridgewater-Raritan High School Robotics team, Team 303, competed at the FIRST Robotics Championship (also known as “Worlds”) in Houston, Texas, from April 28 to May 3.
Team 303 had competed at the Mid-Atlantic District Championships from April 16 to 18 and had been selected to go and compete at Worlds through the Engineering Inspiration Award distinction.
Their week started with a long plane ride to Texas. The team was anxious and excited to participate in the FIRST Championship. It had been nine years since they had an opportunity to compete at Worlds, making it an impressive mark on the school’s history.
On the second day of the competition, Team 303 unpacked the items they needed, including essential materials for their robots. They also held practice matches to ensure the robots worked as expected before entering any official matches.
Team 303’s third day started bright and early with an opening ceremony and the beginning of qualification matches in the morning. There were 150 matches planned for that day, so they had a long day ahead. The team’s resilience shone through as they exhibited grit and determination throughout the whole competition.
Around 600 teams from every corner of the country and the world were participating in this competition, split among 8 divisions. Each division goes through its respective qualifications, making it to the playoff rounds by excelling in its division. Winning teams from each division face off at the playoffs in the last two fields.
The fourth day of Worlds continued with more playoff matches to determine the teams that would qualify for the next level of the competition. The division that Bridgewater-Raritan’s Team 303 competed in had 125 qualifications.
The fifth day started with a new concept: alliance selection, which determines agreements between teams for mutual success in competition. Three representatives from Bridgewater-Raritan’s Team 303 Robotics attended alliance selection, where each game is played by two alliances of three robots. The top eight teams that place at the end of those qualifications become alliance captains and have discretion in alliance coordination.
Alliance selection gives teams the opportunity to pick teams for their alliances, and in Worlds, teams are also allowed to choose a backup in case anything goes wrong with their robots. This adds another dimension to the typical balance of competition directly between teams.
While the three representatives from Team 303 participated in alliance selections, the rest of the team observed the playoffs and final playoffs as a part of the spectating crowd, which was a great experience.
On their sixth day at Worlds, Team 303 went to the Houston Space Center as a way to unwind on an educational and amusing endeavor as a reward after their intense competition at Worlds.
STEM Teacher Jim Griffin, the first-year head Advisor for Team 303, who advises the team with Kristen Mehrbach, discussed how his team is looking forward already.
“Next year’s returning members are already planning for next year’s robot and all of the new initiatives that we will undertake to bring STEM and robotics to our community in hopes of returning to Houston in 2027,” he said.
Sophomore Ronald Liu, a member of Team 3030, shares his thoughts on his experience attending the competition.
“It has been 9 whole years since our team last made it to the World Championships. I am extremely glad that we were able to make it this year, and I hope we can continue to do so in the future,” he said.
Senior Alex Masin, a member of the team since his sophomore year and Team 303 build captain, reacted to the impressive accomplishment.
“I was honestly shocked beyond limits. Though we knew from the start that we might make it, hearing the words that we won the Engineering Inspiration award brought genuine shock to the entire team. We made team history this year,” said Masin.
The team looks forward to continuing this successful momentum next season as they reflect on post-season sentiments in the coming weeks. The team’s final event on their calendar is the Charlie Run, being held at Bridgewater-Raritan High School on June 7 at 10:00 a.m. The Charlie Run in a color run around campus in honor of Charlie Schultz, a transgender alumnus of the team. Any donations (suggested amount of $5) for attendance at the event will go toward the Charlie Schultz Foundation, which provides scholarships to senior team members.
