By Hannah Mah (18S06A), Chairperson, Somakala Subbaraman (18S06K), Secretary and Cai Jiaming (18S06E), Quartermistress

Have you ever been fascinated by your microwave or ever wondered how to escape the inevitable dominance robots will have over the human race? Well in Club Automatica, we won’t actually tell you about any of these but we can put you on the right track to find out more about the world of robotics.

If you have a passion for learning about technology and have a deep sense of curiosity, come join our CCA sessions where we take a hands-on approach to discover how to build working robots. Don’t worry if you have no prior experience in the field of technology, your teammates and pretty much everyone around you will be more than willing to help you along your journey. Moreover, we have coaches whom you can approach whenever you are stuck.

Off season, our CCA is held once a week (tentatively on Wednesday from 3.30-6). We spend our sessions picking up new skills such as learning different programming languages and learning about different mechanisms, or working on the building and coding for upcoming competitions. However, be warned that a lot more commitment is necessary during competition periods as teams meet up more often and the sessions stretch later into the night. But don’t worry, your CCA schedule for the week will be very flexible and depends on your individual teams. Generally, we participate in 2 competitions in Year 5 and one last one in Year 6, all of which provide some of the most enriching experiences one could wish for in JC life.

Here are a bit more details pertaining to the competitions we participate in if you are interested to know more:

• Robocup Junior: During Robocup, members work in teams for 3 different Robocup Leagues: Dance, Soccer and Rescue. Y6s will start preparations in November the year before and Y5s will join their new teams after entering the CCA. The judging for the competition is in late March/April (http://www.robocupsingapore.org/en/singaporeopen/open-2017)

• National Robotics Challenge : Teams work on robots which navigate around a field and perform tasks. Preparations starts in June and will continue on till around September. (http://www.nrc.sg/)

Admittedly, it can get very frustrating when nothing works (which is most of the time) but you’ll have loads of fun and the satisfying feeling of small successes along the way is worth all the dread before that. Through these moments, we develop unforgettable memories and bonds with those we work with and gain the conviction needed to dedicate our time to our beloved CCA. This dedication has hence earned us a few awards, some of them being Best Programming (NRC 2017), first place for Robocup Junior Singapore On Stage (2017) and first place for Robocup Junior Singapore  Soccer, Rescue Line and On Stage(2016, 2015). In 2016, we also represented Singapore in Robocup 2016 in Leipzig, Germany.

At the end of the day, our CCA is really about the people in it and making fond memories with them. If any of these seem interesting to you, please do sign up. There’ll be a simple interview but don’t worry we just wish to see if you have the passion and interest for robotics and if you are able to commit to the club.

See you at open house!