For the last 4 years, Avum has continued their support of student engineers by sponsoring high school robotics in the FIRST Robotics Competition (http://www.usfirst.org). FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) was founded by Dean Kamen in 1989 and the FIRST Robotics Competition began in 1992. The 2018 FRC season had over 3600 active teams from 28 countries around the world. In the FRC, teams compete with 2 other teams in an alliance of 3 teams versus another 3 team alliance.
The FRC game for the 2018 season was called POWER UP and was video game themed. The goal for the season was to take "power cubes", milk crates in a zippered nylon skin, and place them on 1 of 3 balance scales on the field. There were two lower ones on the ends of the field and a tall one at mid field. Teams gained points by tipping the scale to their side and then were awarded a point per second while they maintained the balance in their favor. Teams could get an extra 30 points per robot by having the robot climb at least 1 foot off of the floor using a bar on the tall middle scale. Teams could also push the cubes through portals in the end of the field and stack them in their vault for 5 points a cube to enable "power ups" such as taking control of a balance, doubling balance scoring or getting a free climb for the team.
In the FRC competition, every team around the world finds out what the new game is at 7AM PST on the first Saturday in January during the game reveal. The teams then have 6 weeks to design and build a 120 pound robot for competition to meet the new challenge for the year. After the 6 weeks passes, the teams place their robot in a giant plastic bag and lock it with a non-removable tag.
Team 957 SWARM (South and West Albany Robotic Manics) is a high school robotics team competing in the FIRST Robotics Competition. It is a joint team for both the South Albany and West Albany Oregon high schools as well as the Oregon Connections Academy online school system. The team has actively been competing since 2002. In 2018 the team had 21 students with 8 volunteer mentors and provides the program for free to students. All funding is raised by the team from sponsors and activities during the year. Avum engineer, Robin Hobbensiefken, has served as a team mentor for software and electrical parts of the team over the last 4 years. At the end of the 2017 season, he stepped into the role of the Lead Mentor for SWARM.
2018 was an amazing year for the team. They designed, assembled and programmed a very capable robot. The team named the robot Otis in recognition of Elisha Otis who invented the modern safety elevator. In the Pacific NorthWest division, SWARM competes at two district competitions. SWARM placed 2nd in round-robin qualifying play at both district events versus 37 teams at their Wilsonville event and versus 36 teams at the Lake Oswego district event. This is higher than the team has ever qualified at an event. At both events, the SWARM Alliance lost in the finals.
At the Wilsonville event, the team won the prestigious "Judges Award" for their detailed approach to strategy, game playing and programming skills. After the first event, SWARM was ranked 10th in the PNW out of 154 high school teams. In Lake Oswego, the team won the Motorola Solutions Quality Award celebrating machine robustness in concept and fabrication. Due to the awards and performance, after the Lake Oswego event, SWARM ended up ranked 9th in the PNW.
Based on their performance in the district events, SWARM was invited to the PNW Championships where they ended up ranked 19th of 64 teams at the event. Based on overall season performance, SWARM ended up ranked 15th in the Pacific NorthWest out of 154 teams and qualified for the World Championships in Houston, TX.
At the FRC World Championships, SWARM competed in the Hopper division against 67 other teams from around the world. There were a total of 6 divisions and 405 teams in those divisions competing in Houston. At the end of round robin qualifiers, SWARM ranked 17th of 68 teams. At World Championships, alliance captains choose 3 other teams for at total of 4 teams per alliance so there is an alternate for each alliance. Any of the 3 teams can be used. SWARM was chosen to be on the number 3 alliance with BumbleB from Israel, Ratchet Rockers from Missouri and Walton Robotics from Georgia. The SWARM alliance won 2 out of 3 matches in the quarterfinals. They won 2 straight matches in the semi finals. In the finals their alliance was beaten 2 straight matches by the alliance that went on to play in the Einstein field rounds and won the World Championships in Houston.
The 2018 season was an incredible year for SWARM. The students and mentors all learned a ton and had a lot of fun. The team would not be able to do what they do without the support of their incredibly generous sponsors like Avum.