Robotics teams from four Montgomery County high schools are gearing up for competitions this month through FIRST Robotics Competitions.
FIRST is a national organization that calls its robotics competition, “the ultimate Sport of the Mind.” The nonprofit strives to inspire students to become leaders and innovators in the STEM field through teamwork and mentorship programs.
“It’s to get them interested in it, and not so much to twist their arm into getting interested but to kind of give them a taste of it, to give them the experience of it,” said Dave Wheeler, a mentor for the Northwest High School team. “Because for a lot of people, they find this really interesting, exciting type of work and the competition, it stretches what these high school kids can do.”
Northwest, Whitman, Blair and Poolesville high schools compete through FIRST Chesapeake, which serves the D.C., Maryland and Virginia area. There are four weekends of competitions across different regions, beginning this weekend, and each team will compete in two. On March 10-12, Whitman High School will host a competition, and all Montgomery County teams will be in attendance.
Every year the FIRST national organization announces a new game the robots will play during the season which prevents robots from being reused. Teams start out with a base kit and some standardized parts to keep the robots consistent. Then, students can then build their machines how they please but must use particular models for certain components, Wheeler said.
The top 15 teams from the Chesapeake region will make it to the district finals at the beginning of April and from there, some teams will be selected for the world championship in Texas. Last year, Poolesville High School made it to the worldwide competition where they lost in the final round. Wheeler said just being able to watch a local team advance all that way was exciting.
Despite long days at work as a software engineer, Wheeler said robotics meetings always make him feel energized. The team never questions the need to learn different information, rather the students are determined to understand anything they can to make their robot work. This curiosity, he said, prepares students for college because they see how much more they can learn about technology after high school.
“So, you get an idea for something or you want to try something and then seeing it work at some point in the future after you’ve put a lot of work into it is always really rewarding,” Wheeler said. “So seeing the kids waking up to that is what I really love about it.”
