Students are preparing for the 2026 season of the First Robotic Competition (FRC) that will take place throughout the remainder of the school year. The first competition will be the FIRST in Texas (FIT) District San Antonio Event (TXSAN) March 12 to 16.
The FRC team looks forward to this year’s competition after last year’s success, where the team received a spot in the VEX Robotics World Championship.
“What I enjoy most about FRC is the growth in the students throughout the practices and competitions,” FRC coach Mr. Louis Cavallaro said. “When they had a problem, they had no idea how to solve it, so they tried a few different things and then solved the problem all on their own. Being witness to them becoming self-reliant is what makes FRC what it is.”
FRC students use their skills in fields, such as programming and engineering, to help create and operate robots built for completing various tasks while learning communication and problem solving.
“I primarily joined FRC just because I love to program, and I saw FRC as an opportunity to show my skills as a programmer,” head programmer Ty Fonseca said. “It also looked really fun and interesting to me, and I’ve been enjoying FRC.”
As this is only the second year that the robotics team has been a part of FRC, the team hopes to improve based on their past competition.
“I don’t really expect much other than more than what the team’s already doing,” programmer Collin Gleinser said. “Compared to last year, we have already done more than what we were able to get done last year, but improvement is always good to have.
While the team expects challenges along the way, they plan on fixing and gaining more knowledge that will help them in future years.
“In FRC, you’re gonna encounter a lot of issues along the way,” Fonseca said. “However, there’s no right or wrong way of doing something as long as that thing gets done and if said thing works as intended.”
The team continues to work after school hoping to further build on their abilities and themselves.
“I’m excited to see how the robot comes out because it’s just hard to see right now since everything’s in order,” Cavallaro said. “I’m waiting to see how everything comes together and how the students solve the problems that will come along the way.”