Garland robotics team finds belonging in competition
What students on the robotics team at Northlake Elementary School in Garland got to experience earlier this month at a competition in Dallas goes way beyond fun and games.
"As we were driving here ... their eyes were like 'oh my goodness.' They were sightseeing. Things like you and I might take for granted," said coach John Beltz.
Taking that trip on the highway and seeing the Dallas skyline was, believe it or not, something some of the students had never done before.
The team competed in the largest robotics competition in the world at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center.
"It was really cool. Being part of this is really fun. Walking in it were so many people. It was a really good experience," said fifth grader Brandon Hagston.
For these young people, to be around other students from all over the country and all over the world was an experience to say the least.
"Meeting new people from different countries, states, cities. It's really fun learning new things," Hagston said.
The competition wasn't about winning or losing for the Northlake team; It was about realizing that they belong.
Northlake is a Title 1 school, where many students require food assistance and 80 percent of the families are living at or below the poverty line.
If you want to talk about a moment that's eye opening and life changing, this is it.
"You peel back that layer and it helps with their speaking skills, collaboration, engineering, science, math. They don't even know they're doing some of that," Beltz said.
"The growth has just been... I wish you could have seen them in August and here we are in May, and it's awesome."
Collectively, the group says getting a lot of free stuff during the competition was the best part. But years from now, they'll be able to look back on this time as priceless.
It will be when they were first able to piece together the idea that success has no limits and no boundaries.
