La Mesa's College Prep Middle School Students Earn Their Robotic Stripes

La Mesa's College Preparatory Middle School made the following annoncement on March 15, 2012:

Eight students from (CPMS) competed in the Greater San Diego Botball Tournament last weekend on March 10, at the University of San Diego.

The CPMS Robotics Team was one of 18 regional Botball teams from San Diego, Arizona and Mexico competing at the tournament. The competition was tough and comprised mostly high school teams, but the newly formed middle school team called the Cyber Stripes, took 5th place in the seeding rounds and received the Rookie Award.

Students competing in the tournament were: Nathan Cummins, Leif Erickson, Aaron Hom, James Iannessa, Kenneth Lopez, Chance Lux, Anthony Thomas and Ben Vukelich.

The Cyber Stripes plan to demonstrate their robotics skills and share what they have learned with others through community outreach opportunities in the near future. They will have a robot on display at the San Diego Science Festival, Expo Day at Petco Park on March 24th.

The Cyber Stripes team was launched by CPMS this past fall. Botball is a specialized league for schools and groups to create and complete robots and then compete in an organized tournament setting. Students involved in Botball utilize complex programming and engineering design skills that easily translate into later careers in the technological sector. Botball is thus a fine example of STEM thinking, allowing young people to explore the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Botball can teach students to think and see the world from an advanced, non-liner perspective.

Botball promotes positive team building and greater interpersonal skills as well.

For more information about what Botball is and how one can get involved visit www.botball.org.

CPMS serves students from throughout San Diego County, grades 6-8 (grades 5-8 for the 2012-13 school year). CPMS provides a nurturing community while maintaining high expectations of students as scholars and citizens. With a maximum of 20:1 student to teacher classroom ratio, students receive more individualized support in order to better prepare them for high school and beyond. CPMS understands the importance of partnering with families and the community to enable middle school learners to achieve their goals and strive for excellence.