Palouse Area Robotics Team to compete at EWU

4-H Palouse Area Robotics Team (PART), consisting of high school students ages 14 to 18 from Colfax, Pullman, Moscow, and the surrounding area, earned a spot in the upcoming FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) PNW District Championships to be held at Eastern Washington University at Reece Court on Thursday, April 6 through Friday, April 8, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

The PART SciBorgs will compete against 49 of the top robotics teams in the PNW, with 120 teams from Washington, Oregon, and Alaska.

The students re-designed the arm grabber to be more reliable and robust after the Sundome competition, explained SciBorg mentor Helena Johnson, noting that there's always an opportunity to improve the robot with new components, materials, or programming.

"That's what the engineering process is all about, and the students on this team are always up for the challenge," she said.

The all-county STEM program teaches hands-on designing, building, wiring, and coding a 125-pound robot to play an annual FRC game.

There are over 3,000 teams around the world that tackle the same challenge at once, Johnson explained, adding that it's not just about robots.

The students also learn valuable teamwork, leadership, business, and communication skills from their mentors and veteran students in the club.