About Us

Midlands STEMbotics is the robotics club and competition robotics team(s) for Midlands STEM Charter School in Winnsboro, SC. We were founded as a school robotics club during the 2019-2020 school year, and started as a FIRST Tech Challenge competition team in 2020-2021 as Team #18308, Team RocketForge. The 2023-2024 school year introduced us to our newest team the Mecha Mavericks, #24048.

STEMbotics welcomes MSI students from 4th-12th grade, and our competition teams typically start at 7th grade.  All students are welcome, no matter their experience level. The mission of FIRST® is to inspire young people to be science and technology leaders and innovators, by engaging them in exciting mentor-based programs that build science, engineering, and technology skills, that inspire innovation, and that foster well-rounded life capabilities including self-confidence, communication, and leadership. 

What is First Tech Challenge?

It’s way more than building robots. FIRST Tech Challenge teams (up to 15 team members, grades 7-12) are challenged to design, build, program, and operate robots to compete in a head-to-head challenge in an alliance format.

Guided by adult coaches and mentors, students develop STEM skills and practice engineering principles, while realizing the value of hard work, innovation, and working as a team.

The robot kit is reusable from year to year and can be coded using a variety of levels of Java-based programming. Teams design and build robots, raise funds, design and market their team brand, and do community outreach to earn specific awards. Participants are eligible to apply for $80M+ in college scholarships.

Each season concludes with regional championship events and an exciting FIRST Championship.