ABOUT US
who we are
Team Berkelium is a Berkeley based high school robotics team, open to any students who want to join, regardless of technical background. Every year, we compete in international FIRST robotics competitions against thousands of other high school teams. Our mission is to provide high school students hands-on experience in STEM and business that they will carry with them through college and into their future careers.
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Our mission is to provide team members with hands-on experience in STEM fields, focusing on skills such as programming, machining, design, as well as media and business management. We also encourage the development of soft skills such as leadership, teamwork and mentoring fellow students. We strive to create an inclusive and diverse space, with 48% of students coming from underrepresented communities in STEM (women, BIPOC, Latinx, youth with disabilities, LGBTQIA+).
team History
Team 5419 is based out of Berkeley High School in Berkeley, CA. 5419 (originally the Natural Disasters) became a team in 2015, but we became Berkelium just 2 years ago in 2020. In 2019, our team had just 7-10 people and has grown to over 60 people today, most of the growth being in the last year.
Coming back from online learning, during the 2022 build season, we only had about 20 consistent members, so our main focus turned to recruiting and maintaining engagement. To recruit, we put up signs around the school, participated in club fairs, and spoke to classrooms, and we got over 80 people at our first meeting of the 2022-2023 school year. During the offseason we built an entirely new robot to train our new students, and we went to both of our offseason competitions with two competitive robots. This created long lasting relationships, trained new students, and boosted team engagement.
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This past build season, we've attended 3 regional competitions, starting at the Canadian Pacific Regional to the San Francisco Regional to the most recent Sacramento Regional, where we qualified for championships!
