Oak Mountain Middle School students place in top 10 at national robotics competition

Two Oak Mountain Middle School students placed in the top 10 of three competitions among competitors from across the nation at the VEX Robotics Competition in Grapevine, Texas on June 28-July 2.

Spencer Dunn and Hamid Choucha placed fourth in the Teamwork Challenge, 7th in Programming Skills and 9th in Combined Skills.

This was Spencer and Hamid's first time competing at the VEX Robotics Competition. Spencer prepared for a year for the competition. Hamid, however, came in a month before the competition after Spencer's partner moved to Colorado.

"They've known each other for several years, but they've never worked as a team [before the competition]," Whitehead said. "Hamid and Spencer complement each other extremely well."

Whitehead said Hamid is great at programming and usually competes in high school level competitions. When the Hamid and Spencer arrived at the VEX competition, the program they had created for their robot stopped working, but Hamid was able to completely reprogram the robot. 

Spencer is "never rattled and always very even-keeled."

"In the midst of a competition, [Spencer] is the calming force," Whitehead said. "Because of his calm demeanor he has about him, he is a strong, strong player on this team."

Competitors had to build a robot that would move colored blocks from one side of the playing field to the other and then stack those blocks based on their color in 60 seconds. To build the robot, Spencer and Hamid had to learn about gear ratios and computer programming. 

"I was so thrilled we came in fourth in the nation [in the Teamwork Challenge]," said Sherri Whitehead, Project Lead the Way teacher at Oak Mountain Middle School. "I could not have asked for a better way to end that competition than to let those students get the recognition they deserve."

The Vex Robotics Competition is held in association with National Technology Student Association (TSA) Competition, which provides co-curricular competitions in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.