Lakeview Robotics Team Advances to FIRST® World Championship!

Lakeview competed against 34 other teams from around the state, and only three other teams from Georgia qualified for the FIRST World Championship.

 

“We are incredibly proud of these students,” said John Simpson, Lakeview’s head of school. “The team has advanced to state competition six years, but this is the team’s first trip to the international competition. It’s a huge accomplishment for the students and Lakeview.”

 

The Innovate award recognizes teams that have an innovative and creative robot design, and the Inspire award recognizes teams that are outstanding in all categories of the FIRST Tech Challenge program.

 

“The Inspire award is the one we’re always after as a team,” said Mikhail Lovell, Lakeview’s robotics coach and technology teacher.  “The Inspire award is more important than building the best robot on the field. It’s about being an outstanding team in all respects, from outreach about FIRST, to community service, to leading robot camps, to sharing our robots at the Christmas on Green Street parade and more.”

 

Earning a first place in the Innovate award was the result of a multi-month process of robotic design, prototyping, and revision.

 

“The key design piece that set us apart from the other teams this year was a central mechanism that allowed the robot to act similarly to a construction excavator and have a completely independent top half,” said Lovell.

 

Changes were made after the region tournament to prevent the electronics and cables from being tangled in the rotation system.

 

Lakeview will be among over 400 teams from around the world competing at the 32^nd annual championship.  The FIRST championship is the culmination of a youth robotics competition season and is an annual celebration of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). 

 

The culture of FIRST competition is built around two values: gracious professionalism (Think handshakes instead of chest bumping) and “coopertition” (Think cooperation between teams, not only competition.)

 

An example of this type of sportsmanship occurred at the state meet when the Lakeview team helped a competing team with a broken part.

 

“The other team would not have been able to compete without this piece and our students jumped in to help,” said Simpson. “It was awesome to see their sportsmanship and willingness to help a competitor.”

 

Lovell says robotics attracts a particular type of student, but there’s a place for everyone on a robotics team.

 

“At some level we’re all nerds, but as a coach my goal is to appeal to as many kids as possible,” said Lovell.  “We have kids who only work on code and others who only work on social media and marketing.”

 

The robotics program at Lakeview, which includes a middle school team, goes hand-in-hand with the school’s college prep academics.  Lovell, a Georgia Tech graduate, says a number of his students go on to earn engineering or technology degrees from Georgia Tech, UGA, and other universities.

 

“What’s unique about robotics is that it is one of the few activities that a student can get involved in that has a long-term goal that they have to work toward,” said Lovell, who is in his eighth year of robotics coaching at Lakeview.  “It requires planning months in advance, skill development, and budgeting to get to the end goal.”

 

The six team members who will make the trip to Houston are Dylan Mulka, Henry Stewart, Scott Rivenbark, Adam Lauzon, Emilia Horton, and Lara Martins de Oliveira.

 

Henry Stewart was named a FIRST Dean’s List Award finalist last year as a junior and newcomer to robotics. He was one of only three individual finalists to represent Georgia at the 2022 world championship.

FIRST was founded in 1989 by inventor and entrepreneur Dean Kamen who was disappointed in the number of kids, particularly women and minorities, who did not consider science and technology careers.  He saw robotics as a combination of sports competition and technology and a way to encourage careers in the STEM disciplines.