The Busy World of Ian Bee : Part One : Robots

So I am finally back into the swing of things with the new school year. While having only Saturday off may seem droll and lackluster, I actually prefer to keep busy. Too much rest causes my mind to become stagnant. That being said, I have much on my plate in terms of plans for this year. I hope to bring those plans to fruition in these few remaining months.

For starters, it is almost time for the new season for U.S. FIRST to start. For those unaware, FIRST is an annual robotics competition comprising of thousands of schools, clubs, and organizations with tens of thousands of students, teachers, and mentors helping to expand teamwork, ingenuity, and their overall goal of promoting what they like to call, "gracious professionalism." My school started their own robotics team last year. When the posting went out for the club advisor, I jumped at the opportunity. What better than a teacher of English to take over a club mainly involved with the exploration and implementation of science and technology. Then again, who doesn't love robots?

FIRST stands for For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology

Each year, FIRST creates a new game that becomes the challenge for teams across the world. Each team has six weeks to build a robot from scratch to both solve the game's challenges and compete with other schools at one of hundreds of regional competitions. The winners of these events move onto the finals held in Minnesota. For our school's inaugural season, the game was entitled "Rebound Rumble" In which we had to design a robot that would compete in a game of 3-3 basketball. We fared quite well considering who we were up against. Many thought our team to be a complete joke and had little to no faith in the abilities of citizens of Western Massachusetts.

I find something about lost causes very attractive.

My hometown has FIRST in its blood. My alma mater often had hundreds of students in their robotics club with tens of thousands of dollars in private donations and sponsorships. Because of this, Team 126, better known as Gael Force, has won many championships in its 20+ year experience with FIRST. 

The special name tags I created for our competition. 

Our team, Team 4410, The Cyborg Senators, were comprised of myself, a few incredibly dedicated faculty members, and eight of the most hard working students I have ever come across. Together, we spent those six weeks making fun of each other and eating lots and lots of pizza. Having not one engineer or computer programmer on the team made building a robot from scratch a seemingly insurmountable task. We were, however, able to create something that we were not only proud of, but were able to compete with at our competition at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. I remember vividly the day I told the team that by the end of the six weeks, we would be absolutely sick of each other. Which we were. These students, for those six weeks, would go to school normally. After school, they would spend 4-5 hours extra eating pizza and building the robot. This is dedication that I was simply incapable of at that age. 

Six weeks of blood, sweat, and tears.

After many trials and tribulations, we made our way to WPI for our competition. The competitors were fierce and not very friendly. Nonetheless, we made some friends. and we were able to place 15th out of 32 schools. Not to shabby for a robot that couldn't throw a ball... The entire team was present when we presented our work to the district's school committee at their meeting a few weeks after the competition. 

It took us six weeks to get that light bulb to light up.

Unfortunately, some members of our team moved away and will not be returning for the 2012 season. In fact, my first meeting for the Robotics Team was last Wednesday. I had one student show up. She was in extremely high spirits, however. I take solace in the notion of continuing to advise a club that had such a profound influence on not only me, but its members as well. It is a six weeks that I am very much looking forward to. 

Prepping the robot in our cubicle

For those interested in the program, here's a few starting points. 

1. U.S. FIRST Official Website
2. YouTube Footage of our team winning our last qualifying match!