The high school will add Robotics I class next school year. Its main focus is to teach students how to fly drones during sports’ practices and learn robotics skills. New teacher and coach Cory Warner will teach the class.

“Coach Cleavinger and I suggested the course,” athletic director Troy Rogers said. “The idea was because we fly drones at football practice and we thought if we had a course on flying drones, which is very applicable in many professions, it would help give us a good pool of possible filmers.”

Students taking this class will work toward their FFA Remote Drone Pilot certification. This certification is approved by the Texas Education Agency and counts for students’ CCMR.

“Students who successfully complete the drone certification will be considered by the athletic department for filming athletic practices and events,” CTE director Julie Salvato said.

Four students have already assisted Cleavenger in filming football practices with the drones, including sophomore Haven Horton who doesn’t understand why the class is necessary.

“Last year, I qualified for it without the class,” Horton said. “And now [next] year you have to take a class to do it, which I find pointless. It takes away an elective, and I don’t think you need to be in a class that teaches you how to fly a drone when you have people that are trained or people that can already teach you how to fly a drone.”

Horton said he and the other trained flyers attempted to ask people to join them but without much success.

“They just left because they were bored with it,” Horton said. “I’ve been doing it and it’s been just fine, so I really don’t see why there needs to be a class for it because four people is already enough.”

Sophomore Rae Shannon will take the class to get certified, even though they have flown at practice before .

“They want me to get drone certified, which makes sense, but I don’t understand why they didn’t have the class sooner because I was doing the film crew last year,” Shannon said.

Freshman Jonathan Harris is also one of the students Cleavinger approached to help fly the drones and take videos at football practice. However, he is unable to take the course because he has already chosen his electives.

“It’s enjoyable to do and it gets me out of the classroom every now and again,” Harris said. “I do it to help make sure everyone can get quality film that they need to improve themselves for games.”