Harmony Public Schools’ robotics teams prepare for world championship

EL PASO, Texas (KVIA) -- Six of Harmony Public Schools' robotics teams in El Paso won national championships and will soon bead to St. Louis for the 2026 VEX Robotics World Championship.

The Neo Mustangs, Harmony School of Innovation Chorus, Green Charge and Blue Lightning will represent middle school grade levels. The Galactic and Tanzanite Tigers will represent elementary school grade levels.

This will be middle school student Marco Sanchez' second straight world championship. He said the trophies don't just represent winning, but skills and the competitions' high-stress-environments.

"All the trophies that all of these teams have won don't just boil down to the competitive aspect," Sanchez said. "It boils down to the actual skills, your learning. So that's going to be your design awards, excellence awards, judged awards, all decided upon by your engineering design criteria. the whole point of the program is to focus on real world engineering skills."

Sanchez said he wants to go become a professional engineer. He said he likes the trial and error aspect and the opportunity to get his hands dirty with something he can take pride in.

Sanchez also said he wants to take on the challenge of changing the world in his own way, specifically in fields where engineering is misused.

"If you're not inside these companies making these technologies, there's going to be people who are and they're going to be doing it for the money, for the wrong reasons," Sanchez said. "Artificial intelligence, for example, needs guardrails. But there's people who don't agree with that because of money. If you learn these skills, specifically the programing and computer science aspect of it and you enter these fields you can help change that."