U. S. FIRST Robotic's Competition (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology)

GAME ON! ROBOTS TAKE FIELD

High school students learn computer, engineering skills from statewide competition

By Elisha Anderson Free Press Staff Writer

   It’s a competition in which students are told everyone on the team can turn pro.

   About 5,000 high school students from 207 teams in Michigan are expected to participate in this year’s FIRST Robotics Competition. The teams build robots to compete against each other as they try to win a spot in the 64-team state championship, April 11-13 at Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti.

   Students spent six weeks building their remote-controlled robots prior to the start of district competitions, which are held on the Fridays and Saturdays leading up to the state championship.

   “The idea is, it’s not kids building robots,” said Gail Alpert, president of FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) in Michigan. “It’s kids building with and learning from the pros.”

   Sponsoring companies — including General Motors, Chrysler, Ford, Delphi and Boeing — have engineers work as mentors with the students and many of the software companies give free software to the schools, she said.

   “What happens is, relationships form and the companies want our kids,” Alpert said.

   During the competition, students form alliances with other teams and compete with their robots three-on-three to try to get Frisbees into slots at the ends of the field. There also is a bonus portion of the competition in which teams score points by having their robot climb a pyramid.

   Waterford Mott High School sophomore Alex Enriquez,16, said he aspires to be a robotics engineer and is competing this year for the first time.

   He said it took cooperation, teamwork and engineering skills to enable his team, the Water-ford Mott Destroyers, to get the robot running. One of the difficult parts, he said, is programming. If there is a glitch, students have to go through coding — sometimes many pages of it to figure out a solution. Sophomore Jazzmin Ford, 16, of Detroit attends Marian High School in Bloomfield Hills and said her involvement helped her choose a career path working with computers. She said the mentors for her team — the Mech Warriors — help direct students to the right path. “They don’t give you the answer right away,” she said. “They want you to find it for yourself.” The only state that has more teams than Michigan is California, Alpert said. “The reason for that is because we’ve always had automotive support,” she said. “We’ve expanded to other industries.”

PHOTOS BY ERIC SEALS/DETROIT FREE PRESS

   Hundreds of students and parents pack the gym at Waterford Mott High School on March 9 for the district competition of the FIRST Robotics Competition.

Impi Warriors mascot Nathan Rizzo, 16, a sophomore at Ferndale High School, cheers his team.

Mech Warriors students and parents root their team on at the Waterford district tournament.