From left to right, Kyle Chaney, Jacob Schneider, Sara McAllister, Camren Richards and Jaiteg Mundi pose with their victory banner after competition in Auburn over the weekend. The five are the only W.F. West seniors on Team SWAG 4060.
The accolades keep coming for a robotics competition team from W.F. West High School in Chehalis after district competition in Auburn over the weekend.
Team SWAG 4060 — which stands for Students With A Goal and comprises 21 students — won FIRST Robotics Auburn District Event Friday and Saturday at Auburn Mountainview High School in conjunction with teams from Aviation High School in Tukwila and Issaquah High School. SWAG 4060 also took home the Engineering Inspiration award, a judges’ choice award the FIRST website describes as celebrating “outstanding success in advancing respect and appreciation for enginering within a team’s school and community.”
Team SWAG 4060 was listed as winners along with the Chehalis Foundation, which provides a portion of financial support for the team. Thirty-six teams in total competed in the district event.
Robotics adviser Clifton White said the Chehalis students’ first competition didn’t have the greatest result, but they redeemed themselves over the weekend with a strong performance.
“In the first district competition we didn’t get enough points, but we’re in good shape because of the win and the Engineering Inspiration award,” White said. “Basically, we go on to regionals because of that award.”
FIRST, or For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology, is an organization founded by Segway inventor Dean Kamen and Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Woodie Flowers. The organization sponsors international high school robotics competitions such as the ones in which Team SWAG enters.
This year’s competition, Aerial Assist, challenges teams by giving them two minutes and 30 seconds to score goals on a 25-foot by 54-foot field. Three teams partner with each other, creating an alliance that must defeat an opposing alliance.
In a game geared for offense, White said Team SWAG worked to prevent the other team from scoring — a strategy that worked to near-perfection in the two-day competition.
“We knew everyone was gonna go offense, so we figured we would go strictly defense with some passing ability,” White said. “We’d keep people from scoring as long as we had someone on our team that could score. With the teams that picked us, basically no one could touch us.”
The team will move on to Regionals in Portland April 9-12, and could move to nationals in St. Louis, Mo., April 23-27 with a good showing there.
White and the rest of the robotics team mentors say they’re proud of the students’ accomplishments, especially because 16 of the team’s 21 members are freshmen or sophomores.
“We’ve got a lot of good freshmen coming in next year too,” White said.
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Christopher Brewer: (360) 807-8235
