The College’s Robotics team, the Joebots, continues to go from strength to strength, with their win at the off-season tournament, the Melbourne Robotics Tournament (MRT) in July. The senior team, Team 9147, has taken on a new role as mentors for the next generation of robotics enthusiasts at Joeys, inspiring the junior Joebots with their passion for technology, engineering and robotics.
At an assembly in Term 2, Jonas L (Y12) challenged Joeys’ community to “watch us lose … and watch us win!” This statement proved prophetic. The junior Joebots team initially outperformed the senior team at MRT, due to masterful driving and teamwork by the junior students. They reached a team high rank of fifth after qualifiers, with Flynn A (Y9) snatching a position as an alliance captain. Conversely, the senior team, opting for a defensive strategy, qualified last. Yet, their defensive prowess shone in the finals, where they kept higher-ranked teams from scoring, enabling their alliance members to score.
The Joebots excelled, surpassing their previous year’s runner-up performance to take the title in the finals in an alliance with two other teams. Finals are played with a possible three matches – the Joebots played two finals as the Blue Alliance, winning the first two finals, leading to an outright win alongside Team 4774 “The Drop Bears” from Sydney and Team 9986 “Bot Builders” from Victoria.
Head of Science, Shaun Lambden, noted that in the finals, “the senior team, under a new drive team for the competition of Baxter A (Y11) and Oliver F (Y11), drove defensive masterclasses, keeping higher-ranked and more experienced teams from scoring, allowing their two alliance teams to rack up points … the Joebots gave away no fouls and kept the number one alliance to their lowest scores in the knockout sections.”
The MRT presenter commented when introducing the Joebots in the finals: “This little robot has skimmed its way across the surface for the entire weekend, causing devastation and mayhem!”
With this year’s First Robotics Competition (FRC) theme, Crescendo, the senior team entered the tournament as a “defence robot”, as they deliberately removed the mechanism to shoot “notes” into the various “speakers” and “amplifiers” around the field. This strategy allowed the junior Joebots to gain valuable competitive experience, as the senior team gave them the shooting mechanism from their robot. With limited time, the junior team could then finish building a second robot to enable them to compete at MRT.
Many other teams were surprised by the ambitious move to have two robots competing in only the Joebots’ second year of competition. However, the seamless collaboration between senior and junior team members was remarkable, with senior students embracing and supporting their younger counterparts.
Mr Lambden is delighted that he made the call for the juniors to be responsible for another machine: “The interactions, dynamics within the team and learnings will be so critical for them leading into the 2025 season, having authentically lived it at this competition. I am so very proud of them all.”
Dedicated mentors
The Joebots’ achievements would not have been possible without the dedication of their mentors including Thea van Os, Learning and Innovation Coordinator, who managed logistics, bookings, applications, risk assessments and liaised with staff, parents and stakeholders. Yogisha Sewani, Technology Teacher, designed and built bumpers, taught design skills and supervised students during the event. Lee Braithwaite was dedicated to upskilling the students and maintaining high standards, and Old Boy Timothy Shu (2023) provided coding mentorship and ensured effective troubleshooting processes.
The Joebots are committed to fostering a legacy of curiosity and collaboration at Joeys. “The jubilation with which the entire team celebrated both the overall title win and the efforts of the junior team was inspiring,” reflected Mr Lambden.
Just as the Joebots truly embody the FIRST Robotics value of Gracious Professionalism, through the power of collaboration and teamwork, the junior Joebots look set to continue to grow the robotics co-curricular at Joeys. The boundless potential of these Joeys boys is evident, and we can’t wait to see what they do next!
The team
The Joebots team at MRT included: Marek K (Y12), Baxter A (Y11), Jamie D (Y12), Oliver F (Y11), Jaden G (Y12), Brendon H (Y12), Jonas L (Y12), Laurence L (Y12), Flynn A (Y9), Josh B (Y9), Adrian D (Y9) and Hunter L (Y8).
