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Robotics Students Earn Awards in Regional Competition

Ranney Robotics students competed in another regional competition January 25, 2014—marking their fourth tournament of the 2013-2014 season. The tournament was held at Montville Township High School, in Montville, NJ, and included 27 robots from around the state.

Ranney School brought seven robots to the competition, including a new Middle School robot competing for the first time. Three out of these seven robots won the tournament, marking the team’s second win in a row (see story on January 13 win).

In addition, Robot 3815B led by Sophomore Brandon Gioggia (Belford) won the coveted Excellence Award. “This is the highest award presented in the VEX Robotics Competition. The recipient of this award is a team that exemplifies overall excellence in building a well-rounded VEX robotics program,” according to the description. The judges lauded the team not only for its impressive tournament results but also for its exemplary composure during the judges’ interview and for demonstrating the initiative in helping reset the competition fields after every match, noted Ranney School Robotics Faculty Advisor Chiara Shah.

During the final rounds of a VEX Robotics Competition, robots team up in alliances of three; one main robot is on the field for each match and two robots alternate matches. An alliance made up of three Ranney robots won the overall competition. “This was the first time that an all-Ranney alliance has been formed, and the strategy paid off as it led to all three robots winning the competition!” said Mrs. Shah.

The winning robots included Brandon Gioggia’s Robot 3815B; Robot 3815D, led by Vasilios Nicholas ’16 (Holmdel); and Robot 3815F, led by our new freshmen girls’ team, which was competing for only the second time.

With this win, Ranney Robots D and F earned a spot at the New Jersey State Championship. Two other robots previously qualified for the state championship, bringing the school’s total number of robots going to States to four (see back story) .

At the end of the qualification matches, all 27 robots are ranked in order. Ranney Robots held the top three spots (1st, Team B; 2nd, Team A; and 3rd, Team D). Other Ranney robots had very strong showings as well. In 10th place was Team G, which led our eighth-grade robot and was competing for the first time; in 11th place was Team C; in 14th place was Team F; and in 24th place was Team E. Team rosters are noted below.

Robot teams typically include two to three students—a team leader, a robot driver and a coach—but many of our teams were hampered by the fact that the SAT and ACT tests were being held on the same day. Three of our teams only had one student, and another robot had none of its team members present at the competition. At one point in the competition, Sophomore Vasilios Nicholas was managing controls for two different Ranney robots; and for most of the competition, Brandon Gioggia was running back and forth driving his own robot and also assisting with Amy Winkler’s robot. Throughout all of the chaos, students kept their heads, worked together and even managed to help teams from other schools, by lending out parts, batteries and helping with programming.

The seven Ranney Robot teams on January 25 included:

  • 3815A: Raymond Moser ’15 (Shrewsbury)
  • 3815B: Brandon Gioggia ’16 (Belford)
  • 3815C: designed by Amy Winkler ’15 (Manasquan) assisted by senior Ethan Daniels, not in attendance) and driven most of the day by Colleen Ross ’15 (Morganville) (Of note, Amy took the SAT in the morning and then rushed to the competition in time for the quarterfinal rounds.)
  • 3815D: Vasilios Nicholas ’16 (Holmdel)
  • 3815E: Freshmen Ben Iglesia, Kevin Xia (Colts Neck) and Kyle Lubin (Colts Neck)
  • 3815F: Freshmen Brittany Hofferber (Bay Head), Jillian Ross (Rumson), Olivia Nisbet (Monmouth Beach), Aidan Denver-Moore (Bay Head) and Dana Schioppo (Freehold)
  • 3815G: Eighth-Graders Kiran Shah (Manalapan) and Chip Johnson (Freehold).

There are two more competitions before the State Championship, to be held on February 22, 2014, in Cherry Hill. The next regional competition will take place February 1, in South Brunswick.
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Tinton Falls, NJ 07724
Tel. 732.542.4777
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