Students seek sponsors for 'bot build

Students seek sponsors for 'bot build. Students at West Humber Collegiate are working on their 2012 FIRST Robotics Competition robot. Some of the members of the Robotic team are seen here with last year's model. They are, left to right, Chinmay Amin, lead programmer, and programmers Vraj Patel, Mandish Shah, and Amulik Vora. Staff photo/IAN KELSO

The north Etobicoke students are clear underdogs in the upcoming FIRST Robotics Competition's Greater Toronto West Regional on March 29-31 at the Hershey Centre in Mississauga.

Underdogs because of financial strain, not due to talent or ability.

FIRST - For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology - was the brainchild of U.S. Segway inventor Dean Kamen in 1989. FIRST Robotics Canada was established in 2001 to inspire Canadian high school and elementary school students to pursue further studies and careers in science, technology and engineering.

"The varsity sport for the mind" is what FIRST officials call its robotics competition.

FIRST's intention is to combine competition with co-operation in what US FIRST calls "coopertition."

The Vikes' FIRST team consists of about 20 students who take on roles ranging from hands-on robot construction to programming, fundraising and marketing.

"Students visualize the problem and the solution and come up with the mechanism to help solve it and make it," West Humber manufacturing teacher Patrick Collins explained.

It's week three of the six-week challenge. Students are busy making a mascot uniform, a Viking, out of foam muscles and leftover school uniform materials. A 10 by 10-foot canopy, team T-shirts and a large Vikes banner is also in the works.

"It may seem like a small thing now, but you're building (a whole entry)," said Grade 9 student Roopan Thiara, 14, who put together a presentation school administrators plan to use when they showcase their robot to students at area feeder elementary schools.

Robots in this year's Rebound Rumble challenge must pick up one of 18 available small foam basketballs and score them on one of four hoops, the highest 10-feet tall on a standard 27 by 54-foot field. Greater points are awarded for scoring on higher nets.

The twist? The robot must cross a low barrier by either driving over it or crossing one of three bridges.

Vikes 1514 is seeking both a company to partner with, as well as financial and other sponsorship. While some successful FIRST teams work with a budget of more than $40,000, the Vikes are working with less than $5,000, said Bohdan Kohut, a West Humber Collegiate business teacher who is working with the Vikes on this year's robot.

"Company sponsorship would be great. That would be the creme de la creme," Kohut said. "Any expertise we can get would be invaluable. The kids are here five days a week. Even something as simple as the donation of an extra-large pizza one night. We help out as much as we can, but we're on a limited budget."

FIRST focuses on robotics, but is intended to aid students in making innovative career choices.

It is as close to real-world engineering experience as students can get, FIRST said.

"The skill set is huge and the learning curve is very steep. The team had a big jump from the third year (of competition) to the fourth year. They went from plywood and T-shirts to Lexan (a flexible plastic) and aluminum," Collins said of the technological evolution of the students' robots.

Last year, a University of Toronto engineering student assisted the Vikes with their FIRST robot's development.

"It was neat to see their eyes. You could see the gears turning," Collins said of his young charges.

Last year, 72 high schools and 2,200 students participated in FIRST's Greater Toronto Regional.

The annual event fills a stadium with screaming fans and teams.

"There's loud play-by-play. It's like Hockey Night in Canada meets Robot Wars. It's quite an experience," West Humber Collegiate manufacturing teacher Patrick Collins said of FIRST competition, in which he has participated for four years. "You see the kids up in the stands cheering on their machine. When that machine is doing what it's supposed to do, it's electric. I can't not do it."

Parent mentors Randall Thomas and Jeevan Rambarran lend their career experience to help students in areas not taught in their Rexdale high school.

"Hopefully, it gives kids some insight into what life is like in the working world. Hopefully, they stay in school and go on to university," Thomas said of what drives him to be a FIRST mentor. He is an engineer by training with more than 30 years professional experience. "It helps build social skills for students. Senior students in Grade 12 I've worked with for three years I can now assign them a lead role task."

Rambarran works for a company that makes and repairs laser tag vests and automated banking machines. He has outfitted the FIRST robotics team with a computer and the professional software he uses at work.

"How many times have you ever been in a math class and said, 'when am I ever going to use this?'" Kohut said, noting FIRST gives students a practical application for their learning.

Experiential learning is what teachers call it.

Thomas helped students apply their physics to this year's FIRST competition.

"It's Grade 12 physics; how to calculate trajectories. This year's competition is based directly on that application. I asked students how fast would the initial velocity be to get the ball to travel a certain distance. All the Grade 12s started working on it and got the answer," Thomas said.

Xbox 360 Kinect is a motion sensing input device that enables students to command this year's robot entry. Lead programmer Chinmay Amin, 17, waves his arms. Wheels on the Vikes' 2011 entry move first forward then back.

"I'm interested in math and physics. I thought the robotics application of it was a great opportunity," said Amin, who plans to apply to University of Toronto and University of Waterloo to study software engineering this fall. "If you build it, the robot just sits there. But when you program it, you bring life to it. You tell the robot to do this and that. I find it challenging, interesting."

Collins calls Amin the "heart and soul" of the Vikes' FIRST team.

Last year, the Vikes placed 23 out of 52 in the 2011 FIRST Robotics Competition Greater Toronto Regional. That's a steep climb from their second-to-last place finish in the previous year's competition.

"It feels good to not be losing," Collins said.