1 of Detroit's oldest high schools is starting new tradition with robotics

Marlo Thigpen is unapologetically proud to be a graduate of Cass Technical High School. And in Detroit, Thigpen’s sentiment is shared by many given CT’s reputation for producing successful graduates throughout the school’s 115-year history.

But the 1990 graduate does not stop at Cass Tech when she talks about the quality public school education she received in Detroit. For anyone who has a few minutes to listen, Thigpen will gladly describe the solid educational foundation provided to her at Golightly Educational Center and Logan Elementary during the late 1970s and 1980s.

“I am a proud product of Detroit public schools and I always wanted to give back to the school system that educated me,” said Thigpen, who is a master teacher of mathematics at Pershing High School, which has been an anchor for the historic Conant Gardens neighborhood since opening in 1930.

This school year, Thigpen found a new way to give back to Detroit students as a first-year robotics coach at Pershing. And in doing so, displaying her deep-rooted respect for two of Detroit’s oldest high schools.

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“When you come to Pershing, you’re taught the history of the school and the neighborhood right away. But I also bring that Cass ‘second-to-none’ attitude and I believed our team would rise to the challenge of the experience,” said Thigpen, who began her teaching career in Washington, D.C. after earning degrees from Howard and George Washington universities.

Thigpen’s prophetic belief was proven as her small and youthful team rose all the way to a championship at the FIRST Robotics Competition Detroit District event in March at Cass Tech, where her students formed winning alliances with teams from University of Detroit Jesuit and Notre Dame Preparatory School and Marist Academy en route to the title. On Thursday, Thigpen and three of her four team members — Dakayla Williams, team electrician; Shailyn McKoy, team programmer and driver, and Special Mitchell, general technician — along with assistant coach Vontrice Watson, a master English Language Arts teacher at Pershing, came together via a Microsoft Teams call to relive their championship run along with other moments from their special season.

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Earlier in the week, Thigpen’s plan was to have the group come together for this discussion during the seventh-hour robotics class she teaches at Pershing. However, by Thursday morning, a Teams call was required because classes had been canceled at Pershing for the remainder of the week in the aftermath of post-dismissal gun shots that were fired outside the school on Tuesday. Nonetheless, perhaps driven by another belief she holds that “once a teacher has a student’s trust you can move mountains,” Thigpen sent out invites to the call at 4:30 a.m. Thursday. It was not all that surprising that Watson responded since Watson and Thigpen refer to each other as “work besties.” But the participation of Williams, McKoy and Mitchell — all freshmen — on a day off from school and in the early morning (8:30 a.m.) no less, uncovered a connection to their robotics experience that only the students themselves could describe.

“I’ve become a better leader from joining robotics,” Williams said. “I can talk to people now; I’m not as scared as I used to be. I can have a full conversation with someone and go into depth on what I think they should do better, or how they should do something. And I can say it in a way where they know where I’m coming from and know that I’m coming with the best interests for them.”

McKoy also described how the robotics experience has strengthened her social skills, which has led her to be the “first one to speak,” and also given her the confidence to ask for help and ask others if they need help, at robotics competitions and in her daily interactions.

Mitchell was the final person to join the call on Thursday, but even in the virtual format, it was apparent that her words hit home for her teammates and coaches.

“I have built a lot of courage,” said Mitchell, who had the daunting task of starting two new high schools (Cass and Pershing) this school year. “I could not communicate at the beginning of the year because I was a ninth grader — first year of high school. So robotics has helped me with getting to know people, getting friends, and learning more thorough knowledge.”

Mitchell ended her statement with a giggle. And from early in the call it, became clear that good humor and good chemistry are two of the most effective tools going for the team known in competition circles as Team 5478 — the Pershing Doughbots, which was captained this season by graduating senior Micheal Pillivant.  At some point after team members and coaches joked about their robot becoming known as “Greg,” a wire cutter “Greg Jr.” and a screwdriver “Louie,” it was revealed that Thigpen is also famous for her "Who Dat?!" chant that she breaks out during robotics competitions. Except she substitutes "Doughbots" for the "Saints" — as in the NFL team in New Orleans.

The laughter, clever banter and sense of pride would continue for the Doughbots on Thursday evening when they came together with other students, teachers, coaches and mentors connected to more than 60 schools at Martin Luther King High School for the third annual Detroit Public Schools Community District (DPSCD) STEM Awards ceremony. The event is billed as the “Oscars of STEM” by the District’s Assistant Director of STEM Enrichment Kevin Fite, who organized the gala, which celebrated K-12 student achievements in the areas of academic games, chess, robotics, math bee, science fair, destination imagination, oratorical speeches, debate and even spelling bee.

Without the drama of the Academy Awards — and in far less time — the program held in the still plush King High School auditorium, literally shined a positive light on the full extent of STEM involvement and more across the district. Once the presentation of the awards began, the program’s pace took on warp speed during stretches, with academic games awards presented at 6:26; chess at 6:29; debate and oratorical speeches at 6:36 (following a raffle); destination imagination at 6:39; math bee at 6:44 (after a raffle); robotics at 6:54; science fair at 7:04 (after a raffle); and spelling bee at 7:07.

When Thursday evening’s program concluded, 286 students, teachers, coaches and mentors had been recognized. And some of the award recipients are already talking about their plans for the next school year, including Leon Pryor, who took a bow on the King auditorium stage on three separate occasions, with the last coming after receiving a Coach of the Year award for guiding the middle school robotics squad (Team 14010-Techno Phoenix) at the Foreign Language Immersion and Cultural Studies School (F.L.I.C.S.).

“In robotics, champions are built in the offseason,” said Pryor, a senior game producer for Meta and president and co-founder of the Motor City Alliance, which provides resources and assistance to FIRST robotics teams in metro Detroit, including teams from DPSCD.

Pryor revealed that next week he plans to visit the School at Marygrove, and he does not plan to make that visit alone. Pryor said he will be accompanied by a robot or two, along with students who he has previously coached, and a stash of flyers for students and parents who may be interested in being a part of Marygrove’s robotics team next year. Pryor is personally looking forward to coaching next school year because his son, Leon III, will be entering the school as a high school freshman.

“The summer and early fall provide opportunities for teams to compete. But more importantly, I want our team members to be thinking about the technologies that they may want to use before we receive the challenge in January,” Pryor said, referring to a challenge which will go out worldwide on Jan. 7 to teams competing in the 2023 FIRST Robotics Competition.

For his upcoming recruitment trip to Marygrove, Pryor will need to borrow a friend’s trailer because one robot alone stands nearly 5 feet tall and weighs close to 135 pounds with its battery. Pryor says he does not regard the extra provisions as a hassle because he and his fellow robotics coaches recognized Thursday are helping Detroit students gain engineering skills like fabrication, programming, computer vision, computer-aided design, mechanical engineering and engineering processes.

“The skills the students learn are quite real and quite intense, because you can’t build a robot as large and as complex as the robotics the teams are challenged to build without those skills,” explained Pryor, who also wants Detroit parents to know that there is in the neighborhood of “$100 million” in scholarships available to students nationally that participate in FIRST Robotics.

Like Pryor, Thigpen was inspired by the DPSCD STEM Awards program which was held in person for the first time since 2019, and is ready to do more with her students at Pershing, where staff and students are building a STEAM Lab, and at the Michigan Engineering Zone (MEZ) in Midtown, where her team constructed Greg and receives mentoring and other support.

“I challenge all students to go and use their STEAM skills to be the change they want to see in the world,” said Thigpen, who walked across the King auditorium stage twice Thursday evening, including a stroll with her bestie Watson, as they received the Duo Coaches of the Year award in the high school robotics category. “When I say we are excited, we have so many things that are planned for this team between now and the time they graduate. We approach coaching from a parenting standpoint and I view this as a proud parenting moment that we will build on.”

Scott Talley is a native Detroiter, a proud product of Detroit Public Schools and lifelong lover of Detroit culture in all of its diverse forms. In his second tour with the Free Press, which he grew up reading as a child, he is excited and humbled to cover the city’s neighborhoods and the many interesting people who define its various communities. Contact him at: stalley@freepress.com or follow him on Twitter @STalleyfreep. Read more of Scott's stories at www.freep.com/mosaic/detroit-is/.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Pershing High School Doughbots start new robotics tradition