we are at Elsie Allen high school for the
2019 Sonoma County Robotics Competition.
For the last five or six years I have been the
master of ceremonies so I'm on the mic
but really my role is to teach kids how
to handle that failure and also teach
kids how to handle success and just be
there so that they know, win or lose, they
did great by participating by taking
risks and by trying their best. I think
that the coolest thing about this event
is watching these kids,  just the amazing
things that they come up with, the
problem-solving the troubleshooting the
camaraderie. I've seen the light bulbs go
on in their in their eyes when they
accomplish something it's just a very
positive experience for everybody. This
is the 17th year of our challenge for
fourth through eighth graders and this
year we've had nine events that students
have participated in and those events
include drag racing which was fourth and
fifth graders and they raced down a
16-foot track. The first one to get there wins.
We had off-road racing that was another
16 foot course the kids designed where
autonomous robots to go down the course
and overcome barriers and land in the
green spot. We had free form, this year's
design was the theme of construction and
the robots did a whole area on that. We
had Maze Runner which  involved an
eight by eight foot maze and the
students had to design a robot that
would go and be able to navigate through
the maze in the shortest time possible.
We had king of the hill that pitted two
robots against one another they had to
climb a 4-foot incline and there was a
space at the top there's only large
enough for one robot and the robot to
stay at the top for a one-minute time
period was the winner. 
We had sumo,  two robots battling in a
center ring and the last one to stand wins.  Another one that we had this year
brand-new was a pit of despair and the
pit of despair had a a large six foot by
18 inch box had one foot ramps on either
side and then the inside of it was
filled with styrofoam cornstarch pellets
and robots had to make their way across
the cornstarch pellets which was a
challenge for some. In that event that
was the first time we had them have to
get over like a soft obstacle and was
pretty neat to see the winner who
created a circular design and used that
ingenuity. I mean the coolest things I
see is those relationships between the
children and those like natural raw
emotional reactions that our children
have and really though. It's so
impressive with the sportsmanship and
how our county with over 30 schools we
have all these students and they kind of
all come together and it by the end
they're kind of cheering each other on
but for me that's the magic of the event
this type of experience is important
more so now than ever. Because of
obviously budget cuts it's not something
that's included in many schools. It's the
things inside their brains that they
need to know about technology and coding
and problem solving the troubleshooting
That's the type of thing that will benefit
them throughout their whole lives in
whatever they choose to do. So going
forward we'd really like to see even
more schools participate. I think there's
such a big need for the science the
technology the engineering and just
having a positive family-friendly event.
I mean we had a couple thousand people
here who have to be in a great great
environment, cheer on their children and
enjoy things, and also just provide that
niche for the non athletic students and
the students who don't fit in other
areas. Often robotics calls to them and
they're able to have that success and
have that competition and that
win or lose you know they know they came
they tried they did what they needed to
do to be as successful as they could as
you guys think about what happened this
year you see what's happening here we
would really love to have your school
your team participate and it doesn't
have to be necessarily a school we had
the 4-h group here we've had other
organizations that just get together has
they're interested in robots in
programming and just thinking about how
how things work so if we didn't see you
this year we would love to see you in
2020 compete in our Sonoma County
robotics event great events healthy
environment for the children and we
really appreciate Sonoma County Office
of Education for everything they do to
provide this.
