(February 28, 2003) -- “It’s a glorious day to be out having a pancake breakfast and a garage sale supporting such a worthy cause,” robotics advisor Charles DeVore mused as he sat at one of the many tables set up in front of the school last Saturday for Robotics team 696’s first fundraiser. “It’s going very well considering it’s the first fundraiser of this sort at Clark,” junior David Black said as he straightened the boxes of Krispy Kreme donuts he was selling. The team made over $600 by day’s end.


“It’s more of a community event,” claimed junior Lucy Abramyan, Clark’s only female on the robotics team. “Everyone came to support us. People were so enthusiastic.”

This pancake breakfast and rummage sale fundraiser was held to raise funds  to send Clark’s robotics team to Phoenix, Arizona for their first regional tournament March 13. “We’re really looking forward to the Phoenix competition in March,” said Black. “It looks like we’re having a very successful year.” Senior Patrick Aghajanian added, “We’re just going to try our hardest to win that. We’re going to apply a lot of the strategy methods we’ve been testing over the past six weeks.”

Whereas in the past, Clark’s robotics team has had multiple technical and other difficulties with their robots, this year they claim that there have been no problems thus far. On Feb. 20, the team shipped out their new robot to Phoenix. “The new one that we made, that robot has four motors which gives it the most torque and speed,” explained Aghajanian.  In the past, Clark’s robots were given such names as “Clark Kent” and “Viper.” This year’s robot, although a better performer, does not have an official name, though the team says that unofficially they call it “Heather.”

Not only will Clark’s robotics team and “Heather” have to prepare for their regional tournament in Phoenix they also have to prepare for a regional tournament right here in Los Angeles April 6.  The robotics team, realizing the seriousness of these competitions, has been staying at Clark until wee hours of the morning, working and preparing strategies for the upcoming events.

As for the pancake breakfast and rummage sale last Saturday, the question on most people’s minds would have to be: Was it a success?  As Abramyan put it, “Any money we make is a success!”