DALLAS & PLEASANTON — Four Harvest Park Middle School sixth-graders just put Pleasanton on the global robotics map. Aamya Bajaj, Sendhan Balamurugan, Neil Menon, and Vanya Choibey returned this week from the 2025 VEX Robotics World Championship (May 6–14, Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center, Dallas) sporting the coveted Judges Award for their division, an honor that recognizes teams whose special attributes, exemplary effort, or perseverance stand out to the judging panel.
A leap from classroom to World arena
The Pleasanton Robotics Club team—known as C-3PO—earned their Worlds berth after placing 15th in the North California region for the overall skills of the robot. In Dallas they competed with the top 400 teams from 55 countries, each tasked with designing, building, programming, and piloting robots to conquer this year’s “Rapid Relay” VEX IQ challenge.
Months of preparation
Competing on a world stage didn’t happen overnight.
Since May 2024, the team has logged more than 300+ hands-on hours after school and on weekends. Through iterative design sprints, the team created 4 different versions of their robot, each increasing in complexity and capability that was required to achieve excellence at the global challenge.
Through rigorous driver-skills drills, autonomous coding sessions and mock judging panels, the team showed a lot of grit and creativity.
What impressed the judges
The award recognizes attributes that the judges felt were deserving of special recognition. The team was chosen the best in their division based on their display of exemplary effort and perseverance at the event, and their effective communication skills, teamwork, professionalism, and a student-centered ethos.
This press release was provided by Balamurugan Kannan
