ENGLEWOOD — The Nicholson STEM Academy Lego robotic team is one of 64 teams competing Saturday for first place in the Central Championship Tournament.
Twelve students between fourth and eighth grade will head to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign for the statewide First Lego League competition. They will get a chance to show judges the Lego robots they designed, built and programmed.
This year’s challenge is called the “Trash Trek.” The students had to learn about how trash is collected, sorted and reused. Their challenge was to invent a solution to help eliminate the trash problem in their community. Since the beginning of the school year, they’ve been designing, building and programing their own Lego Mindstorm robots to accomplish trash-themed missions on a playing field. There are 12 missions all together and in front of judges, they get two-and-a-half minutes to successfully complete each mission.
Eighth-grader Rochell Borden, 13, decided to stay on the team for a second year because the experience has been “fun” and “exciting.” She also wants to see her team win before graduating.
“I don’t feel like we did as good as we could have [done], so I wanted to do something different this year,” she said. “I wanted to take us further than we did last year.”
Rochelle said that working on a team isn’t always easy. It comes with challenges, but, she doesn’t let the stress get to her.
“You have to push through it ... it’s going to be hard, but at the end of the day it’s fun,” said the team member. “The competition itself is fun. Even if you don’t come out with the win, just be proud that you made it as far as you did.”
This kind of thinking is one of the lessons the team’s two coaches hope they learn. What the students are learning goes beyond the classroom, said Cindy Cunningham, a Science, Technology, Engineering and Math specialist at the school. These are lifelong skills, she said.
“It’s not easy but they [learn] teamwork ... perseverance, they know not to give up,” Cunningham said. They also learn “professionalism,” she said.
Troy Patterson, the second STEM specialist, said the students are learning how to problem solve. He also hopes this experience will encourage them to enter a STEM field as adults.
“We pray this stays with them as a life experience because we have so few African Americans in engineering fields,” Patterson said. “We’re hoping that they will be those trailblazers to start inventing those things that are not yet fulfilled.”
Nylah Young, 10, is already considering STEM as a career and she’s only in fifth grade.
“I think I might do this for the rest of my life,” she said.
Tresean Curry, another fifth-grader, has been helping to program the robot’s missions. He said the process has been “good” and he likes using his math skills.
Dantrel Warren, a fourth-grader, is helping where he can, but is excited to learn how to program next year.
Sixth-grader Traviana Archer, 11, also likes math. This is her first year on the team.
“It’s exciting yet hard, but it’s awesome too because you build the robots and program them to do the missions,” she said. “It has been exciting working on a team. We’ve become good friends. We laugh and play, but we also work hard.”
The students are confident that they’ll take first place this year.
Principal James E. McNealey Jr. said he was proud of the school’s students. The school is only in its third year as a STEM school.
“Coming from the Englewood area especially, we hear lots of discouraging stories,” he said. “So, for our students to come here and perform the way that they did in our second year of robotics and now going to represent at state, we’re very excited.”
McNealey has enjoyed watching them build and practice. He said he’s been learning right along with them.
“When I saw them last year, I really had no idea what it was about,” he said. “At first I just thought it was putting the Legos together, something simple. But for them to actually program the movement of the robots, several movements ... it was mind-boggling for me.”
He said the school is preparing students to learn how to collaborate and think “outside of the box.”
“We’re not preparing them for typical careers — you know, doctor, teacher, lawyer. We’re developing critical thinkers. Identify a problem, and come up with a way to work with others in order to solve that problem. That’s a part of what robotics is. You have to work with a team of people and come up with ideas.”
The school is asking for donations to help fund transportation and lodging for the competition. They’re trying to raise $5,000. For those who want to contribute, they can contact the school at 773-535-3285.
For more neighborhood news, listen to DNAinfo Radio here:
