The End-Tech team from Endon High School, Staffordshire, has enjoyed a once-in-a-lifetime experience. They are the winners of their statewide Lego competition! This victory is their second consecutive win at this level. They will now go on to represent Staffordshire at the very first Lego League UK National Final in Harrogate later this year.
The team, consisting of five members—James, Malachi, Owen, and two others—spent considerable time coding and building their robot both during and after school. They designed an innovative robot equipped with sophisticated color detectors. These sensors were key to the robot’s success in the competition. It was in this way that the multifunction robot attempted to navigate a range of tasks and challenges, showcasing the production team’s technical ability and creativity.
With four competing teams at the regional contest – such as the previous year’s runner-up team from nearby Bradford – the competition was fierce this year. Our Main Man, Malachi, personally recognized that the stakes were higher than ever when he said in an interview, “Teams are better this year. This feeling speaks to the growing talent of the competitors and puts the pressure on in that you want to make an impact.
Owen underscored the distinctions in their new generation of bot versus previous iterations. He described that, “We’ve developed an entirely different robot equipped with color sensors which provide a wider angle and ease of use.” This innovation not only improved the robot’s functionality but contributed to the team’s overall success in achieving high scores across various tasks.
Their craftsmanship in how they built and programmed their robot was exceptional. Throughout the competition, they impressed judges and crowds alike with compelling narratives that demonstrated their robot’s unique capabilities and their profound grasp of engineering fundamentals. Malachi further emphasized their commitment to improvement, saying, “We’ve swapped to a new coding software that uses Python so it’s much more accurate than it used to be.” This change in coding strategy was almost certainly one of the most important factors in their victory.
The End-Tech team have truly burned the candle at both ends. They have now earned the right to compete against challengers from all across the UK in the national final. Their accomplishment reflects their astounding musical talents, each of them. It’s true that it gains collaboration and creativity across all of the educational spaces.