At the end of the 2024-2025 school year, the Pinewood robotics lab upgraded from Upper Campus’s physics classroom to the Pinewood Engineering Aid and Robotics Lab (PEARL), located in an off-campus office building in Palo Alto.

   Senior Alan Skelley, a captain and hardware lead, has been on the robotics team since his freshman year. In the past, the robotics team met in Room 21, which had limited space for every meeting. 

  “Every day, we would have to bring all the materials out and then clean them before we left,” Skelley said. “It just wasn’t our own space or as convenient as the PEARL, which is a huge step up.”

   Similarly, freshman Arudran Prabhakaran added that the PEARL gave the robotics team a space of their own.

   “Having the PEARL as a space to permanently leave all our supplies is really nice, and it’s an open place to work,” Prabhakaran said.

   On the same note, Prabhakaran described the PEARL in two words: productive and efficient.

   “It’s efficient because of all the permanent facilities you can use there,” Prabhakaran said. “It [also] helps us stay more productive by getting straight to work without needing to set up multiple things each time on campus.”

   The extra space has allowed the robotics team to not only get more practice driving their robot, but also increase their organization. While most tech companies have large carpeted areas with cubicles, the PEARL left the space open as a practice area. Will Rees, the robotics program manager, described how the space was arranged.

   “There’s an entire room dedicated for junior high that is nearly the size of the high school’s big practice room, ” Rees said. “In the high school area … the side offices where managers would be are divided into various functions.”

   These additional functions include a fabrication room with 3D printers, a woodshop, and a construction space. However, Skelley’s favorite part of the PEARL is the big carpeted floor which is used as a practice space.

   “Previously, with robotics happening on upper campus, we would only be able to drive the robot in the tennis courts or in the gym once in a while,” Skelley said. “Now, we can drive it any day we want.”

   While some rooms are not fully furnished yet, Rees hopes to finish and eventually expand the PEARL as a social space for STEM-oriented students.

   “What I like the most about the PEARL is the hope it gives for its future use,” Rees said. “Right now, we are only seeing inklings of it. Where could this go? What are the possibilities?”