News & Announcements

Mayor Alton Craft welcomed more than 200 students from across Alabama and Georgia to the fourth consecutive VEX Robotics competition, which was held at the Oxford Civic Center on January 31 and February 1, 2025, and sponsored by the city of Oxford.

The VEX Robotics program exposes students to valuable skills like communication, collaboration, and time management in a fun and authentic way. It prepares them to become future innovators and increases their interest in related subject areas and careers.

Craft expressed his appreciation for the work done by the city staff and Oxford City Schools faculty members in making the competition successful.

“I and the city council are proud to assist and support bringing this unique opportunity to our local students,” Craft said. “This goes well beyond being just a competition. This encourages new career pathways with new technologies and, with the addition of the new CREATE Workforce Development Center, helps to ensure our students have the tools and experience they need to have access to good, high-paying jobs – many of which are becoming more available here at home with our expanding industrial landscape.”

Craft said he is also pleased these competitions and the classes at CREATE are helping students throughout the region.

“I have always said working as a region gives us a stronger platform from which to attract new industries,” Craft said. “A successful region means a successful Oxford.”

The VEX V5 level is composed of teams competing for top scores by having robots place rings on stakes, move mobile goals, and climb a tower at the end of the match.

Thirty-six middle and high school teams made up the first day of competition involving the VEX V5 level, with four teams from Oxford High School and three teams from Oxford Middle School. OHS received the Excellence Award and Design Award, qualifying them for the regional championship. OMS received the Innovate Award.

The VEX IQ level is in two parts: the Rapid Relay has two robots competing as an alliance; and the Robot Skills Challenge with one robot scoring as many points as possible and a Coding Skills (programming) match, which is done with limited human interaction.

Thirty-three teams of elementary and middle school students competed in the VEX IQ competition on the second and final day of the event, with five Oxford elementary teams bringing home an Excellence Award and qualifying for the regional championship.

Plans are now being made for a new county robotics tournament to be held later this year.