I have a question. So, I am in the eighth grade, and I am one year younger than the age of most eight graders. I would like to continue VEX IQ next year because of this and put this on my college resume as an extracurricular, but I am a little worried that admissions officers may see this as a disadvantage because the VEX IQ competition has “Elementary School” and “Middle School” division, and I am in high school next year. Should I continue it (barring any motivations for “passion”, because I would rather get into a good college, than to be robbed from one because of me taking VEX IQ) or move on to VEX VRC for the sake of admission into a good college?
I was in this exact spot with the Over Under season, and initially because of the school I was moving to, even though I wanted to do IQ, I was forced, kicking and screaming into VRC. Why was I doing the afformentioned kicking and screaming? Because it looked hard. It looked scary. And I would lose what small clout I had with the IQ community. But now, looking back, going into VRC was the best possible thing that could have happened to me. As @Ben-3176R mentioned, you get to work with industry grade materials and platforms, and this customization and expansion of mechanical capabilities taught me so much more than I could have ever learned in IQ. Even though it is harder, and scary, and you may have more passion for IQ, if you truly have a passion for robotics, as I did, then VRC is the right place for you.
I think you should take all those VIQ skills and go to VRC.
TBH, I’ve been a huge fan of VIQ for elementary to get the fundamentals down. I’m a huge fan of the elementary roboteers going to VRC in middle school. It takes a few years to get really good, so that slightly easier MS events will pay off handsomely in HS.