Greendale Robotics Team Advances to World Championship

GREENDALE, WI — A five-person robotics team from Greendale is advancing to the First Lego League robotics championships this April after earning a top-two finish from a pool of the top Wisconsin teams over the weekend.

After winning the Champions Award at Regionals and second Place at Sectionals, Team Gryfftherclaw advanced to compete at the Wisconsin State FLL Tournament in Janesville on February 25.

In Janesville, Gryfftherclaw competed with the top 36 teams from across the state and were selected as one of two teams that will represent Wisconsin at the FLL World Championship held in Detroit in late April.

For this year’s project theme, Hydro Dynamics, the team of Sophia Derrick,13, Ian Hughes 12, London Amado 12, Hudson Simmons 13 and Megan Volkening, 12, were tasked with learning how to locate, transport and use or dispose of water.

They focused on studying combined sewer overflows and discharges of untreated or partially treated wastewater into lakes and rivers during heavy rains.

After months of field trips, research, and talks with local professionals, Gryfftherclaw designed an app-controlled rain barrel, the E-Barrel, that will collect rain water at just the right time to reduce sewer overflows.

The E-Barrel will connect to your phone and can also be set to empty automatically when owners forget to use previously collected water.

The World Championship event will include approximately 100 teams from around the world. This year 32,000 teams from 88 countries participated in FLL. FLL includes three components: Robot Game, Project, and Core Values. In the Robot Game, teams build and program an autonomous robot to perform a series of missions on a four-foot by eight-foot playing field.

Submitted Photos, Published With Permission