By Zach Spicer
An award is presented to an Indiana event partner who has hosted a VEX IQ or VRC event during the robotics season.
For 2026, a Jackson County resident was bestowed the Event Partner of the Year Award.
During the Indiana Robotics State Championship on March 14 at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, Dallas Goecker of Seymour was announced as the recipient of the award.
As he has for five years, Goecker was helping host the state tournament. Part of his role this year was entering all of the award winners for the awards presentation. While doing that, he saw his name.
“There are a lot of good teams here in Jackson County, and they are very supportive of helping me put on these tournaments and hosting them, and I think they do appreciate that there are local events for them to go to,” he said. “You’ll always be appreciative of being appreciated. That definitely feels nice.”
According to TechPoint Youth, the Event Parter of the Year must show true leadership, dedication, patience and fairness and have a passion for helping and supporting all teams. The person also continuously exceeds expectations to create a safe, enjoyable and educational experience for all teams during their event.
The award recipient can be nominated by a coach, student, principal, parent or colleague. Jackson County robotics coaches were given an opportunity to submit nominations.
Goecker has been involved with the robotics program in Jackson County since its inception. His first year of coaching at Trinity Lutheran High School in Seymour was the 2009-10 school year. That year, two Trinity teams qualified for the world tournament in Dallas, Texas. The first VEX Robotics World Championship was held two years earlier.
At a young age, Goecker developed a passion for robotics and competed in events. At the time of becoming a coach, he was working for Willow Garage of Menlo Park, California, which develops hardware and open source software for personal robotics applications.
Goecker also coached robotics at Immanuel Lutheran School in Seymour for 10 years and has hosted events for more than 10 years. In 2018, he was named VEX IQ elementary school Mentor of the Year.
“We’ve been hosting IQ events since Day 1 at Immanuel, but before that, hosting high school VRC events,” he said.
Goecker said Indiana has the largest state championship in the country.
“And the best by far,” he said.
This year, more than 300 robotics teams competed in the state championship, which was hosted by TechPoint Youth for the last time before Indiana moves to a regional championship model for the 2026-27 season.
“They do an incredible job of organizing this event,” Goecker said. “You can imagine to host something at Lucas Oil Stadium takes an incredible amount of attention to detail, and we have a good crew. Then they recruit a good 20 people basically to help them host and run the event.”
Jackson County was represented by four teams at this year’s state tournament and consistently has had teams compete there over the years.
“It is a wonderful opportunity for the kids,” Goecker said. “How often do you get to do something like that? You go to Lucas Oil Stadium and be onstage in Lucas Oil Stadium.”
Goecker said for 2025-26, Jackson County was No. 1 in the state in terms of most VEX Robotics teams per capita with 1.672 teams per 1,000. Jackson County is No. 6 with 78 teams.