LIHUE — The FIRST robotics team is in its final days before leaving for the Hawaii Regional FIRST Robotics Competition at the Stan Sheriff Center at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. “We’ll be 40-strong when we leave March 27,”
LIHUE — The FIRST robotics team is in its final days before leaving for the Hawaii Regional FIRST Robotics Competition at the Stan Sheriff Center at the University of Hawaii at Manoa.
“We’ll be 40-strong when we leave March 27,” said Charlene Steuri, adviser for the Kauai Bots Team 2465. “We have 24 students and 16 adult mentors and chaperones.”
The team includes students from Kapaa and Kauai high schools, Island School, Kawaikini New Century Public Charter School and a home school student.
The competition will feature 39 teams from Australia, China, Singapore and Hawaii.
“This is a real game-changer,” said Kapaa mentor Jim Cox. “There have been many students whose lives were changed after being involved in robotics.”
One of those, Logan Alcott, the team’s control and electrical mentor, started as a robotics student at Island School.
“A lot of the skills I use today in the business of trying to get more efficiency for customers’ electricity I learned in robotics,” he said.
The FIRST Robotics Hawaii Regional competition will start on March 27 and continue through March 29.
“I have a good feel about this year’s team,” Steuri said. “The robot is strong, it does all the functions and the team is strong.”
Sponsors help the team pay expenses.
Through Friday, every Egg McMuffin sold will have a dollar put aside for the robotics programs, statewide, the adviser said.
During last year’s week-long campaign, Steuri said McDonald’s collected more than $30,000, which was divided among the robotics teams.
