San Jose Preparatory High School Storm Troopers #10276 Win Robotics District Championships

Congratulations to San Jose Preparatory High School’s Robotics Team #10276, who are on their way to the State Championship in Jacksonville, FL after winning the North East Florida District FIRST Tech Challenge Qualifier. This will be the team’s second appearance at the State Championship competition since forming in 2015. The team also won the Collins Aerospace Innovate Award, and placed as 1st runners up for the Design Award. The StormTroopers Team #10276, will even have one of its members represent the team in an individual competition for the prestigious Dean’s List Award.

At the District match in Jacksonville on February 1st-2nd, The Stormtroopers Team #10276 won every match that they competed in. They brought home the highest match score of the day of 101 points. The team worked exceptionally together and also worked hard to help other teams gain understanding, additional functionality, and inspiration wherever possible. 

The team is under the guidance of Coach Mike Shelton, Sponsor Chelsey Briggs, and additional Mentors Jeremy Gibeault, Mike Damato, and John Forbess. The team’s adult mentors are exceedingly proud of the students, who work to be professional while interacting with judges, during various rounds of competition, and while scouting and networking with other teams. 

The students, with the help of these mentors and the support of the sponsors, have just twenty-three days to make any necessary design, fabrication or programming changes to their robot to perform specific tasks at the rigorous competitive level at the State Championship. In addition to building a robot each year for the specific game challenges, the team must raise funds through writing grants, community outreach events, making presentations, and utilizing social media to expand the team’s brand as to align with the game theme and promote the core values of FIRST as a whole.

The team operates at San Jose Preparatory High School. During the build season the team meets 2 times every week.  The team’s 11 members are all very active students. These students also participate in various extracurricular activities which include; Drama Club, Theater Productions, Thespian Society, Student Government, and National Honor Society. 

The students grow through STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) within the team and the community as well. The team members learn problem-solving skills, troubleshooting, team building and communication skills as they form alliances with other students representing from teams around the region, the state and the world. FIRST Robotics (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) was started 25 years ago by Dean Kamen, inventor of the Segway.

FIRST Robotics has grown over the years to over 400,000 participating students from over 80 countries. There are over 200 scholarship providers and 25 million dollars in scholarships available to students who participate in FIRST.

We wish the San Jose Preparatory High School Robotics Team #10276 luck as they compete in the First Robotics State Competition on February 28th and 29th. For more information or to sponsor our team please contact Team Mom Bethany Shelton at 904-425-1725.