Thinking about joining? Start here.

Here’s the simple version: your student doesn’t need any experience, and the only cost is the standard WSHS activity fee. Our sponsors fund the team, so every kid who wants in gets to design, build, and compete — whether they’ve never touched a robot or they’ve been taking things apart since they could hold a screwdriver. Below is exactly how to get your student on the team.

First thing’s First

New Family Roadmap

Step 1 — Register with the school district

Chaotic Robotics is an official Winona Senior High School after-school activity, so the first step is signing up through the district’s online activity portal. It only takes a few minutes. The form will ask if you have a physical on file. This is not required to participate in robotics. Check the box and complete the form. WAPS won’t expect you to have one on file.

district registration portal

Step 2 — Register with FIRST

Our competition season runs through FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology), the world’s largest youth robotics organization. To compete, each student needs a free FIRST account for the season, set up by a parent or guardian at firstinspires.org:

  • Go to firstinspires.org, open My Dashboard, and create an account if you don’t already have one.
  • Under Parent/Guardian – Youth, choose Add a Youth and enter your student’s information.
  • When asked to select a program, be sure to choose FIRST Robotics Competition.
  • Enter our team number: 3090.

Don’t worry about getting every detail perfect on your own — we walk every new student and family through this once they join.

firstinspires.org

Step 3 — The season and the competition

The whole school year builds toward one thing: competition. For an intense few weeks — our build season — the team designs, fabricates, wires, and programs a robot from scratch. Then we take it to a FIRST regional tournament: a loud, high-energy arena event where teams from across the region go head-to-head. Think less science fair, more pit crew.

calendar

Step 4 — Travel and logistics

Getting to competition is a team effort, and we keep it simple for families: students always meet at WSHS first, then we travel together as a team in a school van. When we’re bringing the robot and equipment, we tow a trailer, and the students pitch in to load and unload our competition materials — the coach builds that time into the schedule so we always arrive with plenty of room to spare. No separate drop-offs, no chasing directions to a venue: you get your student to school, and the team handles the rest.

FAQ

Please contact us if you have questions which are not answered here.

None at all. Total beginners are genuinely welcome — plenty of our members had never built anything before their first season. Students learn on the team, mentored by coaches and experienced teammates.

There’s no cost to families and students to participate in FIRST. But there is a $70 WSHS activity fee in order to travel with the team.

Yes. A competition robot takes a whole team — programmers, sure, but also designers, fabricators who love working with tools, electrical folks, and students who handle sponsors, presentations, and running the pit. If your student likes building, creating, solving problems, or talking to people, there’s a role for them.

The team meets twice weekly during the Fall, and the build season is the busiest stretch, with extra hours in the weeks before competition. Our competition season schedule (January to April) is still being decided but we’re planning to meet 3 nights a week from 4pm to 7pm and Saturdays for 4 or 5 hours. Our first competition is the first week in March, so we will need to get as much time together as possible in order to compete.

Start with Step 1 above and register through the district portal, then contact us with any questions. We’ll take it from there.

More than you’d expect! If you do have technical skills and can help coach the students that’s great but not required — often, just guiding the students or helping them stay organized when we break out into smaller teams makes the biggest impact. If you’d like to help, just contact us

The team is primarily run by the students! To help things go smoothly, we have a head Coach/Mentor in John Yearous, alongside other volunteer mentors, and all activities are supervised.

We meet in the shop/lab room TBD at WSHS, after school.

Still have questions? Contact us — Our mentors read every message and will get back to you.”