Bolton high school robotics team celebrates successful season at banquet

Humberview Secondary School's Alpha Dogs went to world championships this year

By Zachary Roman

Local high school students made Caledon proud at a world championship robotics competition this year.

The Alpha Dogs are a FIRST robotics team from Humberview Secondary School in Bolton. FIRST stands for “For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology”.

The team designed and built an impressive robot for competitions this year, which led them to win their division at the Provincial championships. This earned them a spot at the world championships in Houston.

After a great showing at the world championships, the Alpha Dogs held a banquet at Humberview on May 18 to celebrate their season and thank their mentors and sponsors. 

At the banquet, attendees were served dinner and watched recap videos from the Alpha Dogs media team, which documented the team's journey over the past school year.

Then, several mentors and Alpha Dogs members spoke to those in attendance and handed out thank you plaques to sponsors. To end the night, the Alpha Dogs had live demonstrations of their robot that impressed the crowd.

Speakers thanked Alpha Dogs alumni who played a big part in the Dogs' season this year. There was also a special thank you for current Grade 12 Alpha Dogs, some of whom have been on the team for years, and will be moving on to the next chapter in their lives.

The senior students thanked their mentors, said their time on the Alpha Dogs was amazing and they wouldn't be where they were if it weren't for them. The senior students explained there's so much background work, time, and effort put in by Alpha Dogs mentors and that they were really appreciative of the way they transformed their high school experience.

David Hilgendorff is a teacher at Humberview and a leading mentor for the Alpha Dogs robotics team. He surprised the team at the banquet with special custom world championship lanyards for their medals to replace the plain ones. 

If you're not familiar with the Alpha Dogs or missed the Citizen's first article on the team this year, read on to learn more:

On the first Saturday of every January, FIRST robotics teams around the world are given a challenge, then have six weeks to design and build a robot that will be able to meet this challenge and be better and faster at it than other robots in competition.

The challenge given to robotics teams this year was to build a robot that could pick up and place a pilon onto a pole, and be able to pick up and place a cube into a box. It also had to be very nimble and be able to balance on a platform that moved like a seesaw.

Hilgendorff said the Alpha Dogs excelled this year because the robot they made was not only great at picking up and using both game pieces, but it was reliable too. The Alpha Dogs were very good at being diligent in checking over their robot and diagnosing any potential problems with it. 

The Ontario FIRST robotics provincial championships were held in Hamilton this year, from April 5 to 8. The Alpha Dogs won the division they were placed in with a record of 15-2-0.

This earned them a place in the world championships, which were held in Houston, Texas from April 19 to 22.

At the FIRST robotics world championships, the Alpha Dogs had a 10-5-0 record. There were 940 teams from around the world competing at the world championships. 

“It's definitely the best season for our team ever, it was pretty exciting,” said Hilgendorff. “We can hold our hands high knowing that we competed with the best in the world.”

The Alpha Dogs have been competing for ten years now, and are very thankful for their sponsors. For more information about the Alpha Dogs, their sponsors, and to see the team in action, those interested can visit 4946.ca.