Redmond Middle Schoolers Win Top Award At Robotics Competition

REDMOND, WA - A team of robot-builders from Evergreen Middle School recently won the top prize at a statewide robotics championship. The Mechanical Dragons team competed in the VEX IQ World Championships on Feb. 23.

Here's an article Lisa Liu, one of the Mechanical Dragons' mothers, wrote about the competion:

Team 47G, Mechanical Dragons, was a strong contender coming into the competition. The team is
made up of four girls who are passionate about STEM, aspired to do more for the robotics
community, and be a role model for the young girls who are interested in STEM. These young
ladies started their Robotic journey last year with great successes. As a rookie team, they won
the Robot Skills Champion and Teamwork Champion in 2018 Washington State Championship
and ranked #30 in the World Championship which had 400 teams around the globe
participating.

After an inspiring experience at the Vex IQ World Championship last year, winning is no longer
the only goal for the girls, they wanted to bring back the energy and give back to the local
robotics community. The great success in their 2018 season inspired a huge increase in the
Robotics club participation in Evergreen Middle School. There are 25 Robotics team in the
school and 13 teams have qualified for State Championship this year comparing to 4 teams
qualifying for the 2018 State Championship. The team shared experiences and mentored an
Elementary Robotic team which had great success (the team won Excellence Award, Robot

Skills Champion, and Teamwork Champion) in the State Championship in Elementary Division,
and really boosted their interests in Robotics and STEM. In addition, each member of 47G has
volunteered at the local Robotic Tournaments this year to give back to the community.

The Mechanical Dragons performed very well on Saturday. They received the highest award
presented at the State Championship, Excellence Award, which is presented to a team that exemplifies overall excellence in creating a high quality VEX robotics program. They are also the Teamwork Champion. With the Excellence Award, Mechanical Dragons is eligible for Excellence Award, Design Award and STEM Research Project Award at Vex IQ World Championship representing Washington State. Their robot skills ranking is #8 in World currently, which makes them a very strong contender in the World Championship. The Vex IQ World Championship will be held in Louisville Kentucky on 4/28.

Being an all girls’ team, Mechanical Dragons are aspired to bring more girls into the STEM field.
They participated in the Girl Powered Challenge this year and has been selected as one of the
finalists. Mechanical Dragons: Soaring Through Robotics documents their journey with Vex IQ
and their aspiration to inspire more girls in participating in the STEM fields.

“The Vex IQ journey has not only taught us how to design, build and program robot, it also
taught us how to work effectively as a team with diverse opinions, and how to deal with failures
and perseverance. In addition, it helped us discovering our inner passion for STEM, and
building our confidence that girls can do STEM successfully. We want to share our success story
with others and build the community awareness of this wonderful Robotics education platform
to encourage more students and girls to consider and enter the STEM fields”. – from
Mechanical Dragons.

If you are interested in learning more about Robotics and Vex IQ, please feel free to contact
them at MechanicalDragons47G@hotmail.com.