The Future is Now: FIRST Robotics in the Harper Creek Schools
A robotics program has been started in the Harper Creek schools and will hopefully spread to other Battle Creek area school districts.
The program is called FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) and was started in November 2010 at Harper Creek High School by science teacher Steve Barry. FIRST is a worldwide program focusing on science, technology, engineering and mathematics. A $6,500 JC Penney grant provided the funding to get the first robot kit for the new robotics team.
The Harper Creek High School students named their team the “Robo-Beavers” and started meeting after school in January 2011. They received a “kit of parts with no instructions,“ said teacher and advisor Steve Barry. The kit consisted of random parts, not necessarily the parts needed to build a specific robot. Code Red, a FIRST Robotics team from the Grand Rapids area, helped mentor the Robo-Beavers as they started their six-week “build season,” which is the time allowed for teams to plan and build a robot for competition.
Nineteen enthusiastic Harper Creek high school students joined the team and started working almost everyday after school for six weeks to build their first robot. First they had to figure out what the parts were that they received in their kit. Next they assigned tasks to each team member as they built their robot to compete against other student-built robots. They had just six weeks to complete this complex and challenging project.
Once their robot was complete it had to be “bagged and tagged” until the competition, so no further work could be done on it. They competed in two competitions and those teams that scored high enough would then move on to a state meet. At the competitions their robot had to complete certain tasks to obtain points. For a first time effort the Harper Creek Robotics team did well making it to the district semi-finals during one of the competitions.
In the fall the program was expanded to Harper Creek Middle School. A group of three teachers, three parents and four Federal Center volunteers mentored 36 5th through 8th grade students in a program called "FIRST Lego Robotics." These Middle School teams competed recently at Michigan State University.
The Harper Creek Robotics program will hopefully be “a catalyst to get FIRST Robotics programs started in other Battle Creek area schools,” said Steve Barry. “I really like this program because it gives the students a hands-on opportunity to see what an engineer does.”
For more information you may contact Steve Barry at Barrys@harpercreek.net or check out the web site www.usfirst.org.
Michael Rio teaches Digital Video Production, Web Design and Digital Multimedia at Harper Creek High School.
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