Published on: 23 March 2017



Each year, the School sends a team of students to compete in the Rescue division of the ‘RoboCup’. RoboCup is an annual, international robotics competition with teams ranging from high school to post-graduate university level competing from all over the world.

Involved in the competition are members from the School’s Robotics Club, comprised of student engineers and programmers who work collectively on solving real-world problems using robots. Members have the opportunity to take on a broad range of technical challenges, making it easy for them to find something that plays to their individual strengths whilst also building expertise in areas they might not have otherwise explored. One of their main areas of focus is developing mobile and intelligent robots to assist first responders in disaster and rescue situations.

Based on lessons learned from last year’s competition held in Leipzig, Germany, members of the Robotics Club have been working on enhancements to the chassis of their main robot. They have also been working on software to improve its autonomy as well as an iPhone application to provide first-person vision via a headset.

“As always, the boys have shown incredible dedication and determination in their preparations. They’re all extremely excited about this year’s event and can’t wait to once again showcase their hard work on the international stage”, says Computer Science Teacher, Mr Graham Nolan.

Contestants in the RoboCup competition are rewarded for entering robots with unique capabilities. This encourages the students to engage their creative thinking abilities and develop solutions to problems that may not have been considered by other teams. The competitive and open-ended nature of this challenge is a powerful source of motivation for the boys, so is the fact that they are working on many of the same challenges as university and post-graduate teams.

This year’s RoboCup competition is being held in Nagoya, Japan from 27 to 31 July. We wish the team the best of luck.