Orange County Schools team advancing to 'worlds' robotic competition after winning the state level contest

An Orange County high school robotics team called the Hedge Hogs is now ready for world competition. It’s an exciting and educational way for students to hone their STEM (Science-Technology-Engineering and Math) skills.

Students from Cedar Ridge and Orange High Schools in Orange County spend countless hours repairing and fine tuning their robot named "Free Fall." Then comes the fun when they put the rolling robot through its paces.

The robot is designed to pick up a series of balls on the competition floor and shoot them into a basket. Once finished, the robot named "Free-Fall" climbs into its own bed. Other schools from across the country and beyond face the same requirements with their own designs.

Veteran team mentor Vickie Moore described the required dimensions. "A half sized robot, 3 by 3 and 4 feet tall. They are 125 pounds. That’s our weight limit." she said.

The team is a member of "FIRST" which promotes STEM education. They’re one of 10 teams from the state now headed for what the team calls the "worlds" competition for 3 days in Houston, Texas starting April 20th.

Some members of the team have been there before so they understand that one glitch can quickly crush their hopes of victory.
"We learn to work together and fix everything as quickly and as effectively as possible," said Sophia Cauwels, a senior team member.

Working as a solid team helped them advance to the big stage. Senior member Ian Moore said, "For us, getting to the worlds required basically winning states and everything fell into place for us. It was an amazing feeling."

Qualifying for the competition is one thing, however, paying the costs of travel, food and hotels for the whole team is another.
So they started a Go-Fund-Me page and actively seek financial support in their communities.

Freshman member, Elle Carrasco said, "Also, Sophia and I tried to construct a video to send out to thank people for sharing and helping us get donations"

Vickie Moore said, "We are trying to get us all there because we really want everybody to be able to go." She added, "There’s so many kinds out there that would love to this opportunity and you really can’t beat the kind of experiential learning they get through doing this kind of work."

After winning State level competition the Orange County schools team is truly ready the world. "Now we’re just seeing everything fall into place – it’s the best feeling I’ve ever had, especially having worked on this for so long," said sophomore member Anthony Riuz.

Moore says the Orange County Schools’ team is the second oldest one in the state with 22 years of experience in Robot competition.