FTC first competition~

As part of my mentorship with the Inland Empire Broncos Robotics club, we as a club participated in our first FTC competition on December 14^th. It had been a long night for Carlos, Regina, Miguel (sort of), and me. We had all spent the night awake and struggling to complete all the requirements necessary for competing in the competition such as the Robot, and our all-encompassing notebook, and putting together a presentation.  We all stayed up on skype and such to keep track of what each other was doing but at around 1:30, Miguel said he was going to take a little nap and that he’d be back in a bit and he was never heard from again. Regina stayed up with us through the night and worked very hard on completing the notebook. I had spent most of my day at a concert with Krystal that ended around 12:30. Then I took her home and drove to Carlos’s house. I got there at one and from that point we worked on our robot in between coffee breaks and snack runs. Our robot was finished at 4:17 AM the next day.

We had about two hours to kill before we had to leave the house and go to the competition so we showered and made breakfast which took up basically our whole morning. We arrived at the competition area around 7:30 which was the recommended time to come. Slowly the rest of our team started to show up and even our mentor decided to get out of bed and join us. We stayed outside of the Pit area and waited before they allowed us in. Many of the teams came in full uniform with vans and busses full of students and gear and us iPoly kids looked raggedy with our 3 boxes and our hastily constructed robot

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Inside the pit area, we all had to wear goggles and many of the teams began mingling with ours and talking and asking questions about our robot and ourselves. Carlos, regina, Miguel and I sat in the chairs, listless hoping nobody would attempt to talk to us. But they did.

We tested our robot in the arena and we did alright.

Much of the beginning consisted of inspections of our hardware and our software as well as judging of our team cohesion and robotic ability. Then after lunch, we moved onto the actual competition where we began to see who really knew what they were doing. We did alright considering that was our first competition. Many of the thrills and ups and downs of the game were crazy and exciting but in the end, we came out 11^th place out of 21 contenders; not too shabby.

We all decided to leave the competition a bit early and we got berated on that but we had won an award and the only one there to pick it up was Miguel and he was not too happy about it. We won the award for best presentation, no surprise there. All in all, it was a good learning experience and lots of fun for the whole club.

FIRST Lego League Volunteering

For the month of November, as part of my mentorship and my senior project i volunteered with the FIRST Lego League for one of their regional qualifiers; a competition to determine who was going to be going to Lego land to compete. I was part of the setup team helping set up the actual competition arena and the next day I was a stage queue runner for two teams. I became sort of a team coach and organizer. I took care of the teams and made sure they were at the place they were supposed to be at the right times. I also encouraged them as well as making sure they were having a good time. It was an all around good experience for me to get into that sort of competition setting where i would be able to learn more about the competition i would be competing in.

These are photos of the night before when we were setting up the arenas and the pit area to receive the teams when they came the next day.

Us, the volunteers being briefed before the teams came and all things became hectic.

The arrival of the teams as they all searched for a place to set down their stuff.

Here is marina, watching the arenas as the kids set up.

Team Robotworks Y

The Bulldogs

These are the teams that i was in charge of the day of the competition.

The end of the day awards ceremony as well. This is the part where all the teams received awards for excellence in certain fields or in competitive spirit.

EQ

1. I reviewed the rule of three for writing an EQ.

• Provide a framework for studies
• Take a stance
• Format

2.  Review the following EQs and

• Tell us if it meets the rule of 3 criteria.
• Tell why it does or why it doesn't

 a.  What is the most important factor in healthy weight loss? 

• It follows rule 1, 2, and 3 in the fact that it does allow the individual to do in depth research on the topic to achieve a final answer. It allows the person to choose a point and argue it backing it up with the research

 b.  What is most important to securing a conviction in a criminal investigation?

• The formatting of this question is weird. It doesn't give any clue or stance as to what they're trying to figure out. They're not looking for anything.

 c.  What is most important in creating a hairstyle that best satisfies a customer?

• This follows all three rules. Although it could be a bit more clear on what aspects of hairstyle creation they will be exploring. The formatting of the question is very good.

 d.  How can an Anesthesiologist best treat chronic pain?

• The question seems very single answer. It does not allow for extra research and several good answers.

3.  Based on your review of the rule of 3 and your experience with assessing four EQs, please write another draft EQ for your senior project.

• What are the most important factors a First Tech Challenge team should consider in order to win a competition? 

Our first Lego Robot

So when we received our kit, we immediately began fiddling with it. This sunday, we banded together to create a robot that can move, and sense when it crashes into a wall. This has been a great achievement so far. We also played with the parts a lot and i attempted to create a crane on my own.

Robotics Progress

Robotics has been going great and we have made great progress since the last time I gave an update. Some of the main things we have done are solidify a final collection idea method, receive the kit of parts from the manufacturer, and also create inventory along with getting an understanding of what we can do with what we have. I also took many pictures of the club working on things.

This is us as a team planning and finalizing the design only a couple minutes before we received the kit.

This is us after receiving the kit of parts and the immense look of joy on our faces when we heard we had gotten it.

Me and a couple members of Mechanical Assembly banded together to create a built to scale arena like the ones they're going to use when we place our robot in competitions.

I also have many pictures of our designs as well as scans of notes we've taken