Robots teach students teamwork, grit

Team of students from Dayton, Oakwood, Kettering, Springboro headed to national contest

For a team of area students, robots are more than fun and games. They’re vehicles for learning about business, engineering and life.

The students’ efforts have qualified them for the FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) robotics world championship later this month in St. Louis, an unusual honor for a rookie team.

BONDS Robotics FRC 5811 — comprised of students from Dayton Early College Academy, Oakwood and Fairmont high schools and a home-school student from Springboro — has landed a trip to the April 27-30 championship.

These students design, build and operate their robot under the watchful eyes of adult mentors. Much of their work takes place at the K12/TEJAS art gallery at 341 S. Jefferson St.

In contests, the team’s goal is to work in three-team alliances to storm and breach fortifications, capturing an opposing team’s castle tower while defending their own.

“I’ve explained the competition as being kind of like a football game for nerds,” said Katy Jo Brown, DECA school director.

Another robotics team from West Carrollton also is headed to the event. Teams from Vandalia, Eaton and Hamilton are enjoying success this year, too.

Mike Neal, a math and physics teacher at West Carrollton High School, is lead mentor for his school’s team, Pirate Robotics.

“This robotics thing has really lifted the spirits of a lot of students,” he said.

He likes how his 15 students readily share spare parts and tools. Upperclassman are expected to show leadership. Everyone is expected to sharpen communication and problem-solving skills, he said.

“You form friendships that you revisit from event to event,” Neal said.

The 18-member Dayton BONDS (Bringing Opportunities Near Dayton Students) team is is raising eyebrows. Recently, the team was ranked fourth in Ohio. In a recent competition in Cincinnati, BONDS finished 17th, another Dayton team finished 36th while an Eaton team finished 48th.

“It’s been fantastic that we’ve had such great success so early on,” said BONDS mentor David Dunn.

“We are now one of the most heralded rookie teams in Ohio FRC (FIRST robotics competition) history,” said Dennis Geehan, a team volunteer.

Students and mentors raise up to $25,000 to design, build and field their robots, so teams need sponsors. They also need to stay on top of maintenance, expenses, marketing and more.

BONDS sponsors include Teradata, FedEx, NASA, DECA, Rotary International and others.

DECA student Jalen Henderson, 15, said working with robots is fun.

“It gets me further involved in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math),” he said. “I actually want to be an engineer for my main career. I know a lot more now than I did starting off.”

Elliot June, 15, an Oakwood High School student, is the team’s business manager.

“I’m having a lot of fun with just organizing the budget and keeping everything on track,” June said.

The competition differs from BotsIQ contests in that robots don’t directly fight each other. The idea is to work with similarly student-built machines to achieve a complex goal.

“This is a little different than the combat robo-wars, where they’re trying to destroy each other,” Dunn said. “We’re working together.”

Brown said the BONDS team is not an official school team for DECA, but it’s an endeavor the school fully supports. Dunn approached her last year about starting a team, pulling students from more than one school.

“The whole idea of bringing folks in the community together to start up a team, we really fell in love with that idea,” Brown said.

Students get a lot out of participation, she said. They cultivate teamwork and learn how to network with other students and solve problems on their feet.

“They come away with some programming skills and some build skills and some marketing skills,” she said.

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