Summary: The Metrobots Team

Three major traits I have gained include time management, teamwork, and diligence. Managing time requires an abundance of practice, and my typical schedule, as a full time mechanical engineering undergraduate student and a part time employee, forced me to plan my days effectively in order to complete all of my work in a timely manner. Much of this work involved participating with teams of people with various backgrounds and personalities. My high school career had little focus on group assignments; however, the university places a major emphasis on working on teams. With this extensive practice, I have developed the ability to work alongside people with extremely different dispositions and backgrounds. Succeeding in the mechanical engineering degree program is not easy, and as a result, I have spent several weeks focused solely on school. Diligently completing difficult assignments has gotten me to where I am today. During my first year of college, an upperclassman told me, “Although the work does not get easier, you get better at it.” The virtues of time management, teamwork, and diligence are evidence that this statement holds

During my sophomore and junior year, I joined the FTC Robotics Team. I was one of the programmers and builders for the robot. I will help the team build the robot and after the robot is done, a group of students and I would program the robot to do some specific tasks. After we are done building and have programed the robot we compete against other schools. During competition, we would meet with other teams and form allies. We operate robots to compete in a challenge with the teams we are allied with.

A challenging new opportunity presented itself as Pat became the STEM instructor for Davidson County’s newest, most innovative middle school, Oak Grove. While she Incorporated her passion for driving students to reach their maximum potential she became a leader in the teaching community as the EXCEL (encourage, excellence, character, enthusiasm and leadership) sponsor for our PBIS team, a sponsor for the Robotics Team, and promoted numerous fundraisers throughout the entire school year for the general purpose of extending educational opportunities for all the students at Oak

Students often leave high school with the ability to recite the quadratic formula from memory or finding the velocity of a hypothetical car driving off of a cliff. However, it is rare to find a student who has the basic knowledge to allow them to function in life on their own as the heavy dependence on common core and courses with rigor prevent them from taking the classes that would benefit them beyond their life as a student. Fortunately, the Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) aims to alleviate this with a vast amount of community service projects and hands-on experiences.

Interest towards engineering was inspired through her involvement with the Robotics Team. Jasmin served as the captain of the Steampunk Penguins for The Mary Louis Academy Robotics Team her senior year of high school. The Steampunk Penguins mostly focused on competing in the First Robotics Competition. Each year the team would work together to build a robot to fit the guidelines of the completion. The team provided Jasmin with an insight on teamwork, leadership skills, and communication skills.

Heather Clancy, a journalist who writes primarily about transformative technology and innovation, writes in her article “Dean Kamen wants you to make mistakes” about Dean Kamen and his non-profit organization, FIRST Robotics (http://www.usfirst.org/). Kamen talks about how American culture glorifies sports competition and he believes using the sports theme model is a way to have American youth excited about science and technology. As a result of his idea FIRST Robotics will see approximately 350,000 students supported by more than 64,000 volunteer mentors during the 2014 season. FIRST began, in 1989, as a high school only program, but due to its Lego League program’s it now had participants from kindergarten to twelfth grade. In addition to the sports themed robotics competition Kamen tries to recruit people who are both celebrities and technologists to help promote the idea that youth should be using engineers and scientists as role models. Furthermore, Kamen has brought technology

In conclusion, the two Latino students, Lorenzo Santillan and Christian Argega; built a robot in their goal and became a robotics team. Therefore, their robot was a champion

Team 967’s annual Linn-Mar Homecoming Parade appearances allow people of our area cities to see what is possible through STEM. Not only does Team 967 impact young children and students, but also parents and elder parade-goers who have not been exposed to FIRST. The Iron Lions also host an event known as Robo-Thanksgiving, where we serve dinner to residents of a nearby assisted living home. Now in the team’s fourth year of hosting this event, many members of Team 967 consider this outreach activity to be their favorite. One final outreach event affecting crowds on a statewide scale is the Iron Lions’ yearly Iowa State Fair demonstration. For 20 minutes, the Iron Lions share a stage with other FRC teams from around Iowa to share what we do through FIRST to hundreds of bystanders. This collaboration, most recently shared with Team Neutrino, FRC Team 3928, is an unparalleled opportunity to reach and inspire a wide variety of people and portray the difference that can be made with STEM, not only mechanically, but

On my visit to the Dunwoody campus, I could not wait to look around. I've been attending the Math and Science Academy for seven years. Even before my sixth grade year, I have always enjoyed constructing things, playing with building blocks, and making little robots. On the night of my sixth grade orientation, I visited my school to be and was surprised when I walked in the front door. I was greeted by an eight foot tall robot made by high school students. They were part of the program called For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST). I

“Make it possible to make it real” is the core principle and mission statement of FIRST® Team 3184, Blaze Robotics. As we enter our seventh year, we blaze a path towards inspiring leadership, innovation, and self-empowerment for the youth of our community through the hands-on application FIRST provides. We focus on developing every individual's strengths to make a difference in the future of the world of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM). Through challenges FIRST gives us and through our unique team dynamics, the students in Blaze Robotics, and our FLL and FTC teams are developing priceless knowledge essential to our futures. By rekindling the flame of Blaze after a loss, we are using this opportunity to start fresh and come

The FIRST Iowa Regional Robotics Competition was held in the UNI Dome and McLeod Center just a few weeks ago, from March 23 through March 25. FIRST is all about combining science, technology and fun. High school students work in teams to design robots and complete complicated tasks under strict regulations in just six weeks. The competition offers a taste of real-world engineering as students are challenged to build a team and brand, enhance teamwork skills, raise funds, build and program a robot, form strategic alliances and compete against tough competition.

Since I had an many amazing opportunities to become a leader in long term engineering projects, I had acquired many skills outside of classes or even the project itself. In my junior and senior year, I became the project manager of Real World Design Challenge (RWDC), as well as the project manager of Endotherm, a Lemelson-MIT InvenTeam. With these amazing challenges and opportunities, I also received a lot of responsibilities. In RWDC, I lead a team of five to design an autonomous aerial vehicle that will fly in order to detect crop damage. With the InvenTeam, Endotherm, I lead a team of eleven to make a bracelet that will prevent vehicular heat stroke in children under five. These two engineering projects are very different from each other

Vex Robotics is about to kick off this week. They have an exciting season ahead, and our competition is called “In the Zone.” The students have to build robots and work with students from other schools as an alliance to beat the other alliances by gaining the most points. There is a large number of students who are interested in working with Vex this year, so the

These robots are known as the ICub, and excel at interacting with the human population safely. One of these robots, known as Molly, exists in Bristol, England (Honigsbaum). This small combination of metals, wires, and computer components actually helps the elderly with simple tasks that they would ordinarily need help with. In addition to helping the elderly, the ICub can also help clean the work space of individuals. Simon, an upper-body humanoid, assists in moving a variety of items and cleaning workspaces. This robot was developed at the Georgia Institute of Technology, and statistics state that, “Simon could tell with close to 80% accuracy whether someone was paying attention or ignoring him.” This proves that it is indeed possible to create helpful machines that can also interact with humans through the regulation and extra development of artificial intelligences. All of the activities that the ICub Robots partake in are completely beneficial to the global society and will have a large impact on the culture of the world as a whole. An added plus to the push for technological development is that countries can use these advancements as a way to better the future of their state. These nations can accomplish this through the integration of robotic aids into their school systems. An instance in which this concept is used occurs in the Connecticut school system. Through Project D.I.S.C.O.V.E.R middle school students

Throughout my high school life, my extracurricular involvement has helped me develop a variety of skills. Primarily, I have been a part of the Leadership and Peer Support group as a project manager of a conference; I exercised my leadership and collaborative skills. As an engineer, there are times where an individual with leadership and cooperative skills must rise and become the leader in different projects. Interpersonal skills play a significant role in an engineer’s life because they will always be required to communicate with new people. Earlier this year, a peer and I decided to start a Student Mentorship Program and as a co-founder of this group, I learned how to problem solve, make decisions, think laterally, and work as a team. As a student, my skills will allow me to accept challenges with confidence and contribute to discussions during lectures with new ideas. Teamwork, leadership, interpersonal and hands-on skills are key abilities engineers must contain in order to be successful.