Doing the robot

Caleb Pender rebuilt his first motor at age 13 in his parents' car-repair shop. From an early age, he was involved in the mechanics of things, and for the past year, he has worked with the robotics team Middle Earth Mechanics.

His efforts paid off: Middle Earth, a homeschool team from Cape Girardeau, is one of four Southeast Missouri teams that will advance to the super regional competition at the end of March.

Southeast Missouri excelled at the state competition last weekend, advancing more teams to the super regionals than St. Louis, Kansas City or the Rolla, Missouri, area -- some of their top competitors.

Super regionals take place March 26 to 28 in Des Moines, Iowa, where teams will compete in hope of advancing to the world championship in St. Louis.

The local teams that will compete are Middle Earth; The Other Guys from Scott City; and Furious George and Girls with Attitude from Chaffee, Missouri.

Eight of the 48 teams competing last weekend at the state level in Rolla were from Southeast Missouri, and half of the 12 teams that made it to the finals were from this area.

Teams are selected for the super regional competition based on how well they do in the robot matches and on several judged categories, said Brad Deken, Southeast Missouri State University chairman of the Department of Polytechnic Studies, who helped host the third qualifying competition in January at Southeast.

Nine teams, including the four from Southeast Missouri, advanced to the super regional competition.

Caleb's mom, Gloria Pender, said it's been a few years since Middle Earth Mechanics has been "back in the swing of things."

The team's mentor, Carlee Criddle, started the team with her children about five years ago.

Pender said her son joined the team after their families connected through homeschooling and their church.

Chaffee Industrial Arts has been excelling all year with its teams, and state proved no different.

Girls with Attitude won the top honor, the Inspire Award, and team Furious George was part of the winning alliance and advanced to super regionals.

Chaffee's third team at state, Semper Fi, won the PTC design award and is the first alternate to qualify for the super regional should any other teams drop out.

Dylan Boswell, left, behind robot, Nick Cassout and Matt Cundiff, all of Scott City, competed against a robotics team from Selvidge Middle School in Ballwin, Missouri. (Submitted photo)

"This is a really big deal for our school," mentor Jaron McMurry said. "We are very excited to receive two, maybe three of the spots in the north region super regional."

The Other Guys are celebrating their first time making it to super regionals.

Mentor Randall Shinn credits the Scott City team's success to a new co-mentor, Travis Estes, and the students' constant enthusiasm in modifying their robot.

"They just kept revising their robot. Every competition, afterward, they would come together and say, 'How can we make this better?'" Shinn said.

Making it to super regionals has been gratifying for Shinn as a mentor, he said.

He added Estes and the growing number of students interested in robotics have helped Scott City's three teams advance in creating better robots.

For the challenge this year, four high-school teams were put into a small arena, then combined to make two teams.

Their robots had 2 1/2 minutes to knock loose a stick holding a container of plastic balls, then pick up the balls and place them in tubes of varying sizes to accumulate points.

Each year this challenge changes, so teams constantly have to rebuild their robots.

"We are absolutely thrilled that teams from our region have done so well," Deken said. "I think these teams have extremely dedicated students and extremely dedicated mentors. Being veteran teams, these students have some experience with the competition as well."

smaue@semissourian.com

388-3644