Members of Alexandria City High School’s award-winning Titan Robotics team are protesting a decision to move the team to a new, smaller dedicated classroom space at the King Street Campus.
Last September, the award-winning Titan Robotics team was informed they would have to divide their 4,000-square-foot space next to the school gym with a new carpentry program. The move took away an area the team used to test the robot they enter in regional and national competitions. Earlier this month, the team was told by an Alexandria City Public Schools facilities administrator that the carpentry program was expanding and that Titan Robotics would be moved to an unused 1,500-square-foot classroom on the ground floor of the King Street Campus.
“Last year, half of our space was reduced without discussion,” Zoe Corazza, a student leader on the team, told the School Board. “This year we are being told our current space will be shifted to a small, ill-suited classroom without the necessary workshop adaptations like proper voltage, ventilation, flooring and safety.”
In a statement emailed to ALXnow, the ACPS Office of Educational Facilities said it is in the early planning stages of construction of the Alexandria City High School King Street Campus’ classroom B131 to convert the space into a robotics space. A representative for the school system said that plans for the space are still being developed and are not available at this time.
“The scope of work plans have been submitted to the City of Alexandria to obtain the required permits to begin reconfigurations,” the office said. “Reconfigurations are scheduled to take place this summer and include the demolition of existing cabinetry and adding a new partition wall to create separate spaces for storage and learning.”
Parent and team mentor Christina Lytle told ALXnow there has been little information on the changes from the school system.
“Nobody communicated with us, so I think that’s the main thing,” Lytle said. “I mean, to me, before you spend a bunch of money or make decisions, don’t you want to have information that would guide those decisions, like data-driven decisions, or is that just me being silly?”
Rising senior Charlotte Ware told the Board that the team runs summer camps for kids of all ages, and brings STEM programming to underserved communities.
“Our team has built robots that have ranked 10th in our DMV district, built robots that can pull themselves off the ground, and have built robots that ranked 6th in competition,” Ware said. “All of the building that goes on in the shop can’t happen without the necessary space to use our CNC router, cut with our saws, and store equipment and supplies in our massive tool chests and supply closets.”
