USA TODAY
April 13, 2010
By Betty Klinck, USA TODAY
In this sport, the players are robots racing up and down a court with a ball to score goals in two nets, bumping and hitting one another to get by, and are controlled by elementary-, middle- or high-school students.
About 400 teams of 10 to 25 students each will engage in these battles of the ‘bots Thursday through Saturday in Atlanta’s 70,000-seat Georgia Dome. The occasion: the FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) Championships.
The event is in conjunction with National Robotics Week, founded by iRobot Corp., and several universities, companies and technology organizations, including FIRST.
Students compete in two-minute high-energy elimination rounds, running between rounds from the court to the pits, “which look like a cross between NASCAR and the Indy 500,” to repair and improve their robots, says FIRST founder Dean Kamen.
Kamen is the inventor of the Segway (the two-wheeled, self-balancing electric vehicle). He began the FIRST competitions 18 years ago to “inspire young people to be science and technology leaders,” according to FIRST’s mission statement.
At 48 inches tall and 117 pounds, Team No. 341’s Miss Daisy robot can aptly maneuver across the field and easily push other robots out of the way. The team from Wissahickon High School in Ambler, Pa., won both the Philadelphia and New York City regional competitions.
“Our robot is very good at controlling the ball and scoring really quickly,” says Team Miss Daisy’s Ryan Morris, a junior at Wissahickon.
The all-girl rookie team from Mary Louis Academy in Jamaica Estates, N.Y., says its robot’s strengths are its speed, agility and excellent steering.
“It’s crazy at the competitions. There’s so much spirit, but everyone’s working together even though we’re up against each other,” says Karra Puccia, a freshman on the Mary Louis Academy team. “There’s a spirit of community.”
Students participate in a six-week design and building period that culminates in regional qualifying competitions leading to the championships in April.
“We couldn’t just create some little sport for them that would be a nerdy little science fair. We wanted to put (the students) in front of the superstars of science and technology — to break the stereotype that all scientists are white males and frizzy-haired psychopaths,” says Kamen, who designed FIRST’s programs to be like a regular sport.
Qualifying teams from all over the world are randomly placed in three-team alliances at the Atlanta Championships.
“The fact that the team that you’re playing against could be with you (on an alliance team) actually works for you. Usually you go and help people with their robots. That’s something I like to do is to go out and help other teams,” says Evan Ostrow of the Miss Daisy Team.
Students are eligible to win up to $12 million in scholarships from FIRST, a non-profit.
“Before I started this competition I wanted to go into computer programming, but now I see there are a lot more fields I like, like mechanical engineering,” says Vanessa Ronan, a junior on the Mary Louis Academy team. “So, I’m not limiting myself.”