WEST SPRINGFIELD – Western New England University (WNE) was host to a FIRST Robotics Competition on the weekend of Mar. 23 and 24. More than 800 high school students from across New England competed and were recognized for outstanding achievement during the competition, including students at West Springfield High School.

FIRST stands for “For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology.” The competitions were founded in 1989 by an inventor named Dean Kamen, with assistance from physicist and MIT professor, Woodie Flowers. Kamen was actively looking for a way to involve children, women and minorities in the careers the science field had to offer. He sought out ways to get students enthusiastic about sciences and felt that a “sports” like competition could be a success. The first competition took place in 1992, making this the 27th year of high school students participating and competing.

The first Saturday of the New Year is the day annually picked to reveal the theme of the competition, giving teams six weeks to prepare their robots. 2019’s theme was “Destination: Deep Space.” Each year the theme is what the story line of the competition and the competition field is based around. For Destination: Deep Space, the robots the high school students created were designed to be able to collect samples off the Planet Primus. Two competing alliances combated unpredictable terrain and weather patterns, making remote robot operation essential to their mission on the planet. The students were allowed two minutes and thirty seconds until liftoff, the alliances had to gather as many cargo pods as possible and prepare their spaceships for departure before a sandstorm was to arrive.

Howard Bernard is the faculty advisor of West Springfield High School’s robotics team. He shared with Reminder Publishing that between the students, the mentors and himself, they put in about 30 hours a week after school and work to build the robot for the competition. West Springfield offers a no cut program for their robotics completion.

“Between design and aspects of fundraising for the competition, there is plenty of room for students with any background and interests,” said Bernard.

Each team has to raise around $25,000 to have the funding to create the robot for the competition.

At the competition, students were given the opportunity to hear from a highly regarded guest speaker. NASA astronaut, Daniel C. Burbank came to WNE to serve as a speaker during the opening ceremonies. Burbank is a resident of Tolland, CT. He began his career as an astronaut with NASA in 1996.

“The skills that you develop here when you’re designing these robots…NASA is solving those same kinds of problems,” Burbank told the students.

Students participating in FIRST are eligible to apply for more than $19 million in scholarships from competitive universities, colleges, and companies. Winners of these scholarships are announced at the FIRST championship. The goal that Kamen set for FIRST since it was established is still significantly improving student’s interests and attitudes towards math and sciences. Participating students have shown increased interest in wanting to pursue a career path in science or engineering, especially with companies that are involved with FIRST.

Barbara Moffat, associate vice president for Media and Community Relations at WNE shared with Reminder Publishing that Western New England University is now offering a scholarship to any student who participates in any of the FIRST events, regardless of their major.