Following last year’s first ever State Tournament berth, the Albany Mock Trial team has had a very successful season. This year’s case is about an opioid overdose death. Teams prepared both sides of the trial – prosecution trying to find the accused guilty and the defense team trying to acquit their defendant.

Work started in late October breaking down the case and into November working on witness
statements, directs and crosses, as well as openings and closings. The team began competition in mid-December with a pair of trials at the Isanti County Courthouse against teams from Cambridge-Isanti.

Albany next participated in the 29th annual Apollo Invitational where both teams got two trials against some very good competition from all around the state. Albany’s more seasoned team went 1-1 that day and the younger squad went 0-2 but gained valuable experience.

The region round began on January 7 with Albany (veteran team) Prosecution defeating Morris Defense in a very close round with a split decision, while Albany White (younger crew) Defense lost a very close match with St. Cloud Cathedral’s Prosecution. Round 2 pitted our locals against always tough Bemidji. Albany White Prosecution lost to Bemidji’s seasoned Defense team in a close battle and Albany’s Defense defeated Bemidji White’s Prosecution by 8.

Round 3 sent the Huskies to Elbow Lake where they took on the squads from West Central Area. Albany White Defense picked up their first win of the year with a 26-point win over the White team from West Central. The Albany Prosecution squad lost their first round in two years in Region 2 with West Central beating the Huskies in a split decision by 3.

The final round of regionals had Albany’s Defense beating Ashby’s Prosecution team by 50. Albany White’s Prosecution lost to Battle Lake’s Defense team by 26.

The Region finals will take place on February 13th and Albany qualified as one of the top two teams from Region 2. They will be on the Prosecution side taking on Battle Lake who will be the defense in the region final trial. The winner earns a trip to the State Tournament in Duluth March 5-6.

Bryan Skavnak spoke to students at Avon Elementary about "Be the Nice Kid." Through storytelling, he had students laughing, smiling, and thinking about what they could do to be the nice kid at Avon Elementary. Afterwards, he joined students for recess to play and continue to encourage his message about being the nice kid. Thanks, PTA and Avon Student Council, for supporting Bryan's visit to Avon Elementary.
To read more about the happenings at Avon Elementary read our December/January newsletter.

What is Robotics? Robotics is an educational extra-curricular activity that teaches students programming, math, project management, teamwork skills, and engineering. The students are in control of the project progress while the coach is there to supervise and assist the students. This year the team is thankful to have the help of Nathan Kalthoff and Noah Kalthoff.
The students will be required to engineer a robot that meets a few standards. The building area must be an 18x18x18 inch cube and the robot must have a max capacity of 8 motors. 
The team will be in an alliance with another VEX Robotics team, an alliance that was assigned at the beginning of the season. However, in the qualifying round teams could be picked to be an ally with one of the qualifying 16 teams. With their alliance, teams will compete against two other teams. The objective is to move blocks into the goals. 
The students compete in a number of tournaments; the Albany VEX Robotics team has competed in two tournaments already. The last tournament is January 7th. Each tournament consists of qualification matches, a Round of 16, quarter finals, semifinals, and finals.