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GHS 'Robowranglers' Competing This Week at
Regional FIRST Competition
March 31, 2005
Greenville Herald Banner
By Matt
Mahrer
 Greenville's
own Team 148, also known as the "Robowranglers,"
will compete in a three-day regional FIRST robotics
competition at Reliant Arena in Houston beginning
Thursday.
FIRST,
an acronym for "For Inspiration and Recognition of
Science and Technology," is organized to inspire
curiosity and create interest in science and
mathematics among today's youth.
The
competition is centered on a new engineering
challenge or "game" each year designed to showcase
the talents of team members.
This
year's challenge, "Triple Play," was introduced in
January and kicked off a six-week collaboration
between students and engineers.
The game
involves several new features, such as three-team
alliances, new game objects and goals called
tetrahedrons, or "tetras," and vision technology.
Robots have been designed to place game tetras in or
on one or more of nine goals to claim ownership and
score points in 2 minute-and-15-second matches.
The
Robowranglers, comprised of 18 students from
Greenville High School, seven engineers from L-3
Communications Integrated Systems, and one mentor
from Sierra Nevada Corporation, will be going
head-to-head with 40 other teams from Texas,
Oklahoma, New Mexico, Mississippi, Florida, and
Ohio, as well as Ecuador and Brazil, at the 2005
Lone Star Regional.
Regional
competitions measure the effectiveness of each
robot, the power of collaboration and partnerships,
and the spirit and determination of students.
Teams
will compete for honors and recognition that rewards
design excellence, competitive play, sportsmanship,
and high-impact partnerships between schools,
businesses and communities.
Last
year, Team 148 earned a silver medal as a Regional
Finalist and a gold medal for Best Web Site Design.
Student
team members include Beth McClellen, Matt Mahrer,
Sarah Wright, Drew Roberts, Brian Wight, Justin
Griggs, and Lizzy Wisdom, seniors; Jason Maxwell,
Kevin Morris, Megan Wineinger, Michael Risley,
Phillip Stromberg, Peter Chung, and Amanda Isham,
juniors; Nathan Follett, Justin Tharp, and Lane
Gould, sophomores; and Logan Marcum, freshman.
Engineers from L-3 are Chris Follett, John Hodapp,
Monty Wineinger, Steve Maxwell, Casey Welch, Adam
Davies, Adam Reppond, and Gabe Cook. Also
mentoring is Brad Marcum from SNC.
Coaching
the team are instructors Vanessa Pope from GHS as
head coach and Terri Galloway from GHS and Johnny
Tharp from New Horizons Learning Center as assistant
coaches.
Anyone
interested in following the robotics competition and
the achievements of the Robowranglers can log on to
the team's Web site,
http://www.robowranglers.com.
The
event will be webcast by NASA.
Mahrer is the president of GHS Robotics and student
executive producer for GHS Media. |
