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HS Students Compete In FIRST Robotics Competition
A trio of teams have banded together to succeed in the 'FIRST Robotics Competition'. The teams Bobcat Robotics from South Windsor, Connecticut, Highrollers from Las Vegas, Nevada, and Gompei and the HERD from Worcester, Massachusetts combined to create a versatile robot geared to succeeding at a number of odd tasks. "These young people had six weeks to perfect their machines. And they had the enthusiasm of any athletic competition. From tie-dyed shirts to human hair dyed in school colors, competitors from 23 countries showed that math, science and brains can provide a lot of excitement ... Whether it is computer programming, wiring a motor or scouting rivals to develop strategy, students said the skills they develop often go beyond the contest. Clearly, the event has piqued the interest of major sponsors such as NASA, which will broadcast webcasts of the competitions."
As someone who was involved in FIRST for the last three years, I wouldn't say that the competition has just now piqued the interest of major sponsors such as NASA - I'd say that they were integral to the development of FIRST from the beginning, most especially NASA.
The summary also gave the impression that the three teams combined to create one robot - well no, each team has a seperate robot in FIRST, and this years' competition allowed three teams per side.
On a personal note, oh how I miss FIRST. Last year (my senior year) was when I had the greatest enthusiasm for the program, and I did indeed dye my hair blue and orange. It's a shame that was also my school's last year before the team disbanded. I would strongly encourage any slashdotter to volunteer for a local FIRST team - the whole robot-making experience leaves a lasting thirst for engineering that mentors can help shape into a high schooler's bright future.
I am pretty sure I have heard of previous robotics competitions... so FIRST much be an acronym and not capitalized for emphasis. Anyone know what it stands for?
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FIRST is quite good - I was in a team competing from the UK, unfortunately, for teams outside the US/Canada it's fairly hard to raise the money to build the robot and get the team to the event!
Some sort of initiative to help teams outside of North America would be good I think - there is a fair bit of interest over here in the UK.
But most people forget that, just like most teams forget what the actual prize is - by the time the finals roll around, the kids are so pumped to be doing this the actual prize is almost an afterthought.
Returning from our first FIRST regional in NH in 97, my boss asked me how it went. I told him I'd been teaching for 17 years, and this was the first time I had to sit down and put my head between my knees becasue I was about to pass out watching my students do something academic.
In retrospect, it is the single most effective thing I've seen in now 27 years of teaching to get kids to "do their darndest, no holds barred" like we always imagine kids should do in school.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
Shouldn't "Robotics Competition" be limited to Robots?
-- www.globaltics.net
Political discussion for a new world
While this probably won't get too much play outside of the tech community, it's good to see there is at least an interest in computer science/robotics in the high school level. It wasn't until college that i had the ability to tinker with some robots, and it was a great experience and definitely taught me a lot about the field, not just theory.
Now i just can't wait for robotics teams to get a slice of that high school football budget.
Were these really robots or were they simply radio-controlled devices...with a human in control?
Anybody there ever read "I, Robot" by Isaac Asimov? That series of short stories will enlighten you to what robots are/will be.
Fata viam invenient.
Just for the heck of it, here's a couple robot kits worth a look:
- Lego Mindstorms NXT (note: flash-based site with music)
The Lego Mindstorms kits have been around for a while now, but they offer almost infinite possibilities to those willing to experiment with different approaches to accomplishing a particular goal. Devices as complicated as photocopiers have been built using these kits.
- VEX Robotics Kits
The VEX kits are fairly new compared to the Lego Mindstorms sets, but are a bit more advanced and could be dubbed as an "Erector Set", but with a brain. The VEX kits were developed in part by FIRST and were briefly distributed by Radio Shack in a move to get more people interested in robotics.
8==8 Bones 8==8
Ok.
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FIRST stands for "For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology".
These are not just remote-control toys. Camera systems are used for fully autonomous operation during portions of the competition. More hi-tech teams use sonar, infra-red and other devices. Indeed, for the geeks out there I'll point out that the "remove control" is actually a 900 mghz modem - not your standard little 2 joystick controller.
Teams compete in alliances of 3 robots. 2 alliances are on the field at the same time, and each trys to score the highest. Defense (aka contact) is DEFINITELY allowed, although intentional attempting to damage other robots is highly discouraged.
The motto of first is one of "Gracious Professionialism". I.e. - if your robot is broken at a competition, you can be sure of getting half a dozen teams all trying to help you get it back on the field.
There are very few limits placed on the overall robot developmenet - you must use their motors, radio system, and batteries. There is also a limit on robot weight and size.
Go over and read the rules at www.usfirst.org - or better yet, go over here and watch some of the semi-final matches at the world championships that went on in Atlanta this weekend:
http://www.soap.circuitrunners.com/2007/movies/cu
The movies you want are at the bottom with the longer names - the semifinals and finals on that field. There are thousands of teams and this is competitive as all heck. Every big-name company you can think of that is involved in technology sponsers it - from Motorola to Ford.
FIRST is ok, I did it for two years, but it isn't something that most /. readers would find terribly interesting to participate in.
Really, the name says it all. "For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology". The program does all of that, and it is great for getting kids who would otherwise never have such opportunities involved in some fun stuff.
What FIRST is NOT however, is a robotics competition. The years I participated the rounds were 2-3 minutes long, and 20 to 30 seconds of that time were dedicated to autonomous operation. Most teams didn't even try to do anything during the "autonomous period", or they simply had their robot drive forward for 5 seconds then spin circles, or something similarly uninteresting. The "programming" was all done inside of a function that was provided, manipulating variables that were provided. No direct access to either input, or most particularly to output. Where the wiring was concerned the prescribed method was to plug all of the provided parts together in accordance with the manual. "Custom circuits" were sort of allowed, although they had to undergo a complicated inspection process, and were under no conditions whatsoever allowed to interface directly with any motors/actuators/etc. Basically no one used "custom circuits", except a few of the teams that had professional engineers building their "robots" for them while they stood on the sidelines.
One particular incident stands out in my memory: During a practice round just before the finals one of the teams we were teamed up with broke a mechanism on their robot's arm. But their "mentor" who had designed and built the robot was out to lunch. One of the kids was crying, while the rest of them just stood around with no idea what to do. We had to fix their robot for them.
Anyway, don't get me wrong, FIRST is a great way to inspire kids, one of our team members went from working at a fast food restaraunt to going off to some game design school (which I was skeptical of, but I talked to him the other day and it seems to be working out ok). But as a "robotics competition" FIRST is way overrated.
As a faculty member in engineering, I totally support FIRST robotics and FIRST lego league.
At the same time, it seems that the results skew toward pushing students into ME, not EE or CS (or my favorite, CHE).
Although the robotics could involve neat sensing and computing (EE) and algorithm development (CS) the students take home message is that all engineering is levers, gears, etc (ME). The high schoolers don't do much with the automation side of things (their adult mentors sort most of that out usually) and the middle school FIRST lego kids only do very simple programs (move forward 5 seconds, turn left, move forward again...).
At least it gives them some motivation to check out STEM careers.