Robotics club is one of the oft-overlooked programs at the high school, and I found myself wanting to learn more about it, so I interviewed one of the members, Joe Beukelman, to see what I could find out.

What’s your name, and what club are you a part of?

I’m Joe Beukelman and I’m part of the robotics club.

Could you explain what you do in robotics club?<

We build and program a robot to compete in competitions, and the robot has to accomplish certain tasks (depending on the year). We also have to manage our budget and communicate with local businesses for money.

Who leads the program?

Mr. Bambrook is our head mentor and First Tech Challenge runs the competitions.

What do you like the most about robotics?

I really enjoy cadding; it’s fun to cad on a daily basis with good pieces of equipment.

What is cadding?

Cadding is short for Computer Aided Design, which is when you use a program like Autodesk Inventor to create robot parts digitally, so you can put the robot together on the computer to see what it looks like before it’s built.

How often do you meet?

We meet on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday from 3:30-5:30 in the robotics classroom.

Would you recommend robotics to other students?

Yes! It’s fun to work as a team, and it’s interesting to learn about different things like coding and building robots to accomplish things.