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Ranney Robotics Enter World Championship Fourth Year in a Row

J Team heads to Worlds; students hold their own at states.
Ranney School’s J Team, including students Will Zheng, Dana Schioppo, Mike Zheng and Jack DeNicola, has earned qualification for the 2016 VEX Robotics World Championship, taking place in Kentucky April 20-23. This will mark the fourth world championship our students have entered.
 
“They earned their qualification through impressively high scores throughout the season on skills challenges, which involves a single robot scoring as many points as possible within 60 seconds in two different categories: driver controlled and programming,” explains Robotics Advisor Chiara Shah. “Our J Team consistently earned high scores in both categories, making them one of the top robots in the state of New Jersey in skills.”
 
In fact, the J Team was Ranney's most decorated team this year, earning five out of the program’s 13 awards, including several Tournament Championships and Finalist awards, a Judges Award and an Amaze award.
 
Ranney School will be joining seven other New Jersey teams at Worlds, including teams from High Tech High, Cherry Hill High School East, South Brunswick High School and Middlesex County Academy.
 
In addition to Worlds, Ranney will have five teams competing at a national tournament in early April through a special "Open Division.” In this division, robots can use non-VEX parts, and rules are somewhat modified from the normal VEX game. Our two teams are represented by students in Mrs. Shah's Advanced Robotics course:
Team C2460A - Ben Iglesia, Will Zheng, Mike Zheng, Dean Parker and Vasilios Nicholas; and Team C2460B - Brandon Gioggia, Grace Economou, JD Mullally and Thomas Bruno.
 
Three of our teams – A, B and J (see student groupings below) - earned qualification for the High School Division tournament as well. Teams qualify for this tournament by winning a competition at some point in the season.
 
In related news, five of Ranney’s robotics teams competed at the State Championship on February 21 in Cherry Hill.  Of the 129 teams competing across New Jersey this year, 45 earned spots at states.
 
Our Upper School teams included:
 
3815A (Ben Iglesia, Chris Glenn and Chip Johnson). The A Team finished 20th out of 45 robots, making it into the semifinal rounds. This team earned an impressive four awards over the 2015-16 season, including a Tournament Championship and a Programming Skills Award.
 
3815B (Brandon Gioggia, Jillian Ross, Nick Ross and Aidan Denver-Moore). The B team finished 21st out of 45 robots, and made it to the quarterfinals.
 
3815C (Alex Klatsky, Rohan Sharma and Luke Denver-Moore). The C team finished 39th out of 45 robots.
 
3815J (Will Zheng, Dana Schioppo, Mike Zheng and Jack DeNicola). The J team finished 11th out of 45 robots and made it all the way to the semifinals.
 
3815F (Greg Marx and eighth-grader Seth Marx). The F team is our newest team this year. They finished 33rd out of 45 robots, and earned qualification for states through an impressive 3rd place programming skills score in early February.

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Ranney School

235 Hope Road
Tinton Falls, NJ 07724
Tel. 732.542.4777
Our mission is to know and value every child, nurturing intellectual curiosity and confidence, and inspiring students to lead honorably, think creatively, and contribute meaningfully to society.