Gateway to the West, a VEX Robotics signature event, will be coming to Wheeling for the third annual year from January 28-31. The event will be held in the Highlands Sports Complex and will be open to all. Around 80 teams will be in attendance and they will be coming from 16 states and Canada.
The Ohio County Robotics Program has been working hard to set up for this event, to ensure everything runs smoothly. When registration opened for the competition in October, the event had filled within 54 seconds for the high school competition.
“In education, we hope to inspire critical thinking, creativity, and collaboration in our students to prepare them for the careers that they will pursue,” said Jojo Shay, Innovation Director for Ohio County Schools.
The process of making this competition successful takes a lot of hard-work and planning behind the scenes. Dr. Luke Shepherd, Jojo Shay, and the team from WV Robotics alliance have been putting everything together to allow for this event to happen. The CTE programs at Wheeling Park High School, are helping to supply banners, stickers, and trophies for the event. Many volunteers are going to be judging and scorekeeping, along with students from the high school teams helping to set up for the middle schoolers.
“We’ve been building these robots since summer, and it’s nice to be able to show all the other teams our work and see what they have built as well,” said Christopher Alkhouri, member of the 62629X team for Wheeling Park High School.
The sponsors of the event are: West Virginia University Robotics Engineering, West Virginia Department of Education, Expand, The Stifel Endowment, Siemens, Visit Wheeling, WVU Medicine, the Ohio County Commission, McKinley Architecture and Engineering, and the WV Robotics Alliance.
Since it is a signature event, the Tournament Champions and the recipients of the Excellence Award will qualify to attend the VEX Robotics World Competition in St. Louis, Missouri in April . This will also allow for many students who don’t qualify for the world competition a chance to experience something similar by getting to compete and interact with teams from cities around the country that they wouldn’t normally compete against.
This competition brings a lot of attention and new faces to the city of Wheeling. With well over 1,000 people coming to compete or watch, activity in Wheeling becomes more rapid, especially within restaurants, hotels, and local businesses. This event brings tourism to Wheeling, where people get to visit and explore what our city has to offer.
“I think it is very exciting to see students showcase their original engineering designs to achieve success with the parameters of the game that is put before them each year,” said Jojo Shay.
Admission is free, and all are welcome to come and support the community. It is always a good experience to watch robots from around the country compete.
