World Chairman’s Winners, Regional Alliance Captain and Event Winner, STEM Advocacy results in state funding for FRC practice fields
The Green Machine’s 14th season as a FIRST Robotics team was arguably one of the best yet. At the World Championship in Detroit, we were awarded the World Championship Chairman’s Award for our FIRST and STEM outreach, qualifying us for a spot in the FIRST Robotics Hall of Fame. Our robot, Zeta, ranked 18th prior to alliance selection at the Championship, and we were selected as second pick by fellow MN Team 5172 – Gators. Our alliance made it to the division finals – the furthest we’ve ever been with our robot at the Championship!
Zeta, The Green Machine’s 2019 robot, competed in the game “Destination: Deep Space.” Zeta was designed to excel at placing Hatch Panels, and Cargo into the Cargo Ship and the first level of the Rocket Ship. Each hatch panel placed was worth 2 points, and each cargo scored was worth 3 points. Once there were only 30 seconds left in the match Zeta would clamp onto the 3rd level of the HAB and flip into a “handstand” to earn 12 points. We continued iterating the capabilities of our robot to better match the needs of the game. After an amazing performance at Championships, we tweaked the climbing mechanism once more to better prepare for the MSHSL State Tournament.
This season also marked a very significant achievement for our Team: we won our first Regional competition in 14 years! As an alliance captain at the Minnesota North Star Regional, we joined teams 2549 – Millerbots and 3082 – Chicken Bot Pie, in winning first place with a perfect 6-0-0 record in the playoffs.
STEM advocacy remains at the forefront of our outreach efforts. With our help, our state Senator, Melisa Franzen (DFL-49), introduced three new STEM Bills in 2019. These STEM bills were written into an omnibus bill, to provide more funding for STEM programs in the state, and most importantly, to make practice fields accessible to more teams- both urban and rural. In July 2019, DEED granted $100,000 to FIRST Upper Midwest to manage. Team 1816 mentors are working with FUM to ensure development of up to five competitive robotics hubs throughout Minnesota.
Throughout the year, 1816 hosted LEGO Robotics camps, robot demonstrations, and represented FIRST at the Minnesota State Fair. The Team appeared at six elementary school Open Houses to inspire participation in FIRST LEGO League and FIRST LEGO League Jr. All levels of FIRST are now in our district, for a total of 26 teams. 260+ students are directly engaged with FIRST, up 24% from 2015. 3 new Edina FTC teams formed and competed in the 2019 season.
Our STEM outreach continued to reach students who do not have easy access to FIRST programs in Minneapolis homeless shelters. We celebrated the successes of these students with mini-Expos, a chance for the students to explain to parents, relatives, and friends what they designed and built. 1816 women members and mentors demonstrated FIRST robots at the 15th annual Fox9 Girls, Science, and Technology event at the Science Museum of Minnesota before 11,000 participants.1816 members also demoed Zeta at the SWE National Conference in Minneapolis.
1816 continued to appear at Sponsor Demos, including those at Medtronic and Seagate. This year, FIRST sponsor Rockwell Collins asked 1816 to demo our robot alongside other FIRST teams. 1816 sponsor DOW also continued to grow its support by increasing their annual investment to $10,000 in the 2019 season. This increased amount of funding not only lets us support our Edina FIRST program through increased support and mentorship, it allowed us to invest in workshop equipment that led to our robot’s success this season!