On Saturday, 25 November, the school's VEX Robotics team entered a second round of the national competition. Held at the North London Collegiate School for Girls, this was another regional event where the team were hoping to qualify for the national finals. Our original plan had been to learn from the first regional competition so that we had a better chance in the second one. However, they did so well in the first regional competition that they had qualified for the nationals (twice), so this was a lower stakes affair. Rather than rest on their laurels, though, the students were keen to push their current robot as much as possible - and they did so spectacularly. They had the highest scoring robot there and even managed to qualify for the national final for a third time! Their teamwork, planning and engineering skills are definitely formidable.

There is only so far, though, that the current robot design can take them. In March, they compete in the national finals in Telford. To compete at this level, their robot is going to need a complete redesign to enable it to score maximum points. To help them do this, the team are looking for any company (engineering or otherwise) that would be interested in sponsoring them. They need money to get themselves and the robot to the nationals, stay in Telford for a couple of nights and afford the extra motors and kit that the bigger, better robot will need.

If anyone knows of a company that would be interested, please could you pass on this story to them? For more details, contact robturner@suttongrammar.school.