Building a better robot

MY TY WEEK:'AT THE START of Transition Year, it seemed we weren't doing anything, but as the months went by things really picked up. There have been so many highlights: we've undertaken a SafeFood cert which lets you work in a restaurant, and challenged ourselves with a kickboxing course. For our TY Enterprise class, 15 students set up a mini-business and organised a fashion show in Galway. We raised €1,500 for a local charity, Cardiac Risk in Young (Cry). It's close to our hearts because last year a boy in our class died of sudden cardiac arrest.

“But Lego League has been the big highlight. The competition was organised by Irish Robotics and there were about 15 teams in Ireland. The final was held in Galway in February. It involved programming a Lego robot to go through an obstacle course and complete tasks such as picking up bollards and making sure nothing gets knocked over. This year’s theme was ‘movement’, so we did a project on transport, and looked at the problem of traffic in Galway city.

“Lego League is a chance to learn about engineering. We learned how to programme robots and build strong and stable models that can navigate the course – and we won. We’re now on our way to Georgia in the US, where we will compete with 80 teams from all over the world. I never expected such opportunities from TY.”

Eoghan Mac Cuarta (16), Coláiste Na Coiribe, Co Galway