All Saints robotics team qualifies for international competition

Team Blitz, a middle school robotics team from All Saints Catholic School, is building on a legacy of success with an invitation to VEX Robotics World Championships. The event, the largest robotics competition in the world, takes place from May 9-11 in Dallas, TX and Team Blitz is raising funds to make the trip a reality.

Only four spots were available for middle school teams from Maine – All Saints will be the only Maine Catholic school and the only Bangor-area middle school team to participate in the competition having won the Excellence Award at the state competition. The five-student team is made up of 8th graders McKinley Robinson-Rice and Ryan Burns and 6th graders Joe King, Gabe Hikel, and Chase Oettinger.

“This team is very excited to compete in the world competition,” said Casey Murphy, who serves as team coach. “There will be over 40 countries represented and up to 500 teams competing. It will be an amazing cultural experience, and the competition level will be higher than we have ever experienced before."

The students have been working on their robot design since May of 2024. The robot is designed for a VEX game called High Stakes and must be able to move and lift rings. 

“There are 48 rings on the field. Half are red and half are blue. The goal is to put as many of your colored rings on a stake to score points,” said Gabe Hikel. “You can also score points by elevating on a ladder in the middle of the field.”

For the robot, students start with pieces of metal, screws, nuts, axles, sensors and robot electronics (brain, radio, controller, battery). The project begins with an engineering design process and each team member has a specific role in the design, build and refinement. 

Students drive their robot manually with a game controller for competition matches. In addition, students program the robot to achieve as many points on the field as possible using autonomous programming. 

At each stage, the robot is improved – in fact, Team BLITZ will completely rebuild theirs prior to worlds so it can win as many games points as possible.

“I, mainly, am looking forward to the experience in Texas that all of us will have,” said Chase Oettinger. “We worked really hard to make our way to this point and it is really amazing that we were given an invitation.”

The team of five is fundraising for airfare, ground transportation, and hotel accommodations for themselves and required parent chaperones. Donations can be made directly at: https://allsaintsmaine.org/donate.