The regular school board meeting at Corry Area School District saw a group of visitors Monday night. The LEGO League competed at Penn State Behrend on Jan. 14 against 29 other districts, and it was the Corry team under the direction of Calan Vance that took home a first-place trophy.
The team, along with coach Vance came to Monday’s meeting to tell the board about the competition and thank them for their support.
The first-place trophy was awarded to the team of fifth graders for meeting the CORE values of the league. The CORE values are inclusion, discovery, teamwork, innovation, impact and fun.
As this is his second year as a LEGO League coach, Vance explained to the board that it’s gratifying to see the students succeed this year after also doing well last year.
“We knuckled down and practiced hard,” Vance said. “I couldn’t be more proud of these boys.”
Students on the winning team were John Higley, Jaxon Gambrell, Beckett Howard, Ricky Wiswell and Andon Styborski.
The club decreased in size over the past year from around 35 students to 16, but Vance said the smaller groups allowed the students to prioritize and work together efficiently. He mentioned that there was a lot of leadership as certain students would step in and help if someone was shy or apprehensive.
Team member Andon abounded with excitement as he told the school board about the fun time he had with his team.
The students engaged in research, problem solving, coding and engineering to build and program a LEGO robot that navigated the mission of a robot game.
The competition is part of the FIRST LEGO League, which is a nationwide league meant to inspire and facilitate STEM learning (science, technology, engineering and mathematics). The club was formerly called the FIRST Robotics club.
“It’s a blast,” Vance said. “It’s amazing to see all these kids come together from different school districts … and the robots are amazing.”
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