Canyon Crest Academy wins first place in Los Angeles Championship

The ‘First Tech Challenge’ (FTC) robotics team from Canyon Crest Academy High School was awarded the first place trophy and Winning Alliance Award at the 2009 Los Angeles Championship Tournament on Dec. 12. It was an exciting day of competing against 13 other area schools with the CCA team winning every match to accumulate the highest number of points. Their robot, Mr. Roboto, successfully released the game balls, then swept them up and consistently catapulted them into the scoring basket before the buzzer ended each match. The team was also a finalist for the Think Award which recognizes the team that best manages the design engineering process as documented in their Engineering Notebook. As a result of this first place win, the CCA team, named Domo Arigato, has been invited to participate in the FIRST World Championship in Atlanta in April 2010.
The team is composed of 10 junior-year students at CCA who have been meeting since August to design, build and program their robot. Team organizer Kristin May sums up the experience, "Learning how to do something like brainstorming and engineering a robot is an experience I will appreciate for the rest of my life. Winning was just an added bonus." Team member Karla Renschler, who was one of the skilled robot drivers at the tournament, added, "Winning the tournament was an incredible experience. I never imagined that we would get this far and that everything we worked for would pay off. The FTC experience so far has taught me to try new challenges and have the courage to tackle them and be successful."
Canyon Crest Academy’s FIRST Robotics Competition Team outstanding concept has been has been acknowledged in November by the United States agency NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) with a $5,500 grant . Canyon Crest Academy (CCA) is one of only three high schools in San Diego to capture this prestigious award.
FIRST (parent organization of FTC) is a national robotics program whose mission is to inspire young people to be innovative science and technology leaders while adhering to the values of “gracious professionalism,” including teamwork, mutual respect, the pursuit of excellence, and community outreach through the beneficial application of technology. Students from around the world design, build, and program their team robot, then compete in regional robotics tournaments. FIRST is supported by over 3,500 corporations, 85,000 volunteers, and includes four programs (including FTC) that involve over 200,000 students.
The team is very thankful to CCA and the CCA Foundation for their support and encouragement, and was proud to present the first place trophy to Principal Brian Kohn. The big challenge for the team now is to raise $12,000 so they can travel to Atlanta in April and represent San Diego and their high school at the FIRST World Championship.
For information on sponsorship opportunities for the CCA FTC team, please contact the CCA Foundation at www.canyoncrestfoundation.org. The CCA Foundation is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit all volunteer organization that supports the educational programs at CCA. Please specify that you want to support the CCA FTC team, Domo Arigato, at the World Championship.