Growing robotics programs in Michigan builds STEM, leadership skills

May 6—TRAVERSE CITY — In March 2020, the Traverse City Central High School FIRST Robotics team had just finished up their first competition of the season and was packing for the next when they found out the rest of their season was canceled because of the pandemic.

During the year prior, the team had not gone very far. In 2020, they felt their robot could take them much further, said Grady Luyt, a senior at Central and the current tech captain of the team. That potential was unable to be realized in 2020 and, in 2021, the only competitions that were held for FIRST Robotics were virtual.

But, during the 2022 season, the team, called The TC Raptors, had built a robot capable of getting them to the FIRST Robotics World Competition.

"Getting to Worlds this season was almost like a redemption of 2020 and 2019," Luyt said.

On April 16, at the state FIRST Robotics competition, the Raptors found out at 11 p.m. that they were going to compete among the top teams in the world. The team's members had been watching the standings shift as teams above and below them competed and won awards.

The Raptors packed their robot to be shipped from Saginaw to Houston, Texas for the World Competition and returned to Traverse City at around 1 a.m. Sunday morning. By Monday afternoon, the team had piled into two vans and embarked on their 20-hour journey to Houston. In Houston, they competed from Wednesday to Saturday, placed 59th in their field, won a high level safety award and headed home Sunday.

The stress of competition, the anticipation for results and the long drives to and from Texas were an emotional rollercoaster, but it was worth it to see and experience the spectacle of the FIRST Robotics World Competition, said Sage Brown, senior at TC Central and non-tech captain of the team.

"Our goal this year was just to get to Worlds," Brown said. "We didn't really care how we did at Worlds, but we wanted to be there after two years of not having competition."

The Raptors was one of over 60 teams from Michigan to compete at the FIRST Robotics World Championship in Houston. One Michigan team from Grosse Pointe won one of the top prizes at the event.

In the past few years, team robotics programs have grown immensely as an extracurricular for school-age kids in Michigan. In 2013, there were just over 100 high school FIRST robotics teams in Michigan, said Gail Alpert, director of corporate involvement and sponsorships with FIRST in Michigan, the state branch of FIRST Robotics. In 2019, Michigan tallied 568 high school teams.

As for FIRST programs for younger kids, those have "grown hugely" in recent years as well, Alpert said. Michigan is now second in the U.S. in terms of the total number of FIRST Robotics teams across all programs and first in the number of high school teams.

During the last decade, after mentoring for her son's robotics team, Alpert made it her goal to expand the number of teams in the state and began reaching out to schools to help them create teams. In 2013, Michigan began offering a state-funded grant that would pay for some of the expensive fees for robotics competitions and give the coaches a stipend, which helped get more schools to build teams, Alpert said.

"Ten years ago, the only opportunity was with FIRST Robotics in high school," said Phillip Leete, a former robotics coach and founder of Quarkmine. "That was it."

Previously, a variety of robotics programs were not available locally in northern Michigan, Leete said. Now, schools all over the region offer a variety of successful robotics programs and more robotics programs for students of all ages are popping up. FIRST Robotics has its own programs for K-8 students and other organizations, like the Robotics Education & Competition Foundation, have separate and different competitions for Pre-K-12 students.

Leete, a former teacher and FIRST Robotics coach, was an early adopter of the REC Foundation's VEX Robotics structure, he said. In 2016, he started Quarkmine as a resource for northwest Michigan schools to understand competitive robotics and develop teams.

During COVID, Quarkmine shifted focus to bringing robots and other technology to classrooms, giving presentations and inspiring kids to get involved in engineering or robotics early on.

Carol Johnson, teacher at Grand Traverse Area Catholic Schools and Traverse City Area Public Schools, said she also tries to incorporate as many robotics lessons into her classes as possible.

"By introducing it in the classroom that has helped the program grow, too, because then kids see it and they say, 'Oh, I'll join your team because this is pretty fun,'" Johnson said.

Johnson has coached robotics teams for nearly a decade. This year, she and the three sixth graders from St. Elizabeth Ann Seaton Middle School who make up the team "Robo-Saints" are heading to the VEX Robotics World Championship.

Students, coaches and mentors who have witnessed the growth and development of robotics programs in northern Michigan attest to its positive impacts on students, developmentally and even career-wise.

Being on robotics teams connects students with professionals in the STEM field, gives them an edge on their resume and teaches kids valuable lessons in STEM, creativity, leadership and teamwork. It steeps their connection to and interest in STEM fields, teaches them real-world skills like fundraising and puts them face to face with real-time problem-solving.

"I don't think I've seen leadership developed by students faster in any other programs," said Bill Klein, a mentor for Suttons Bay High School's FIRST Robotics team.

Many of the mentors and coaches who have been involved in robotics programs in Michigan said seeing students grow and benefit from robotics has kept them in it and even made them hopeful for the future.

"I'm thankful that we have young minds that are involved in this sort of thing and gives me some security about the future that we've got some people that are passionate about being creative, and solving problems," said Larry Rager, coach and lead mentor for Mancelona High School's FIRST Robotics team.

The lack of in-person competition during COVID and the heightened pressure placed on teachers and students caused a loss of about 100 Michigan FIRST Robotic teams during the last two years, Alpert said. The numbers rebounded a little bit in 2022, the first year with all in-person competitions since 2020, with many teams operating as rookie teams with almost no students who had previously competed, Alpert said.

Luyt and Brown have both been on the TC Central FIRST Robotics team since their freshman year. They stayed on the team through two disappointing seasons, enjoying the quality time the team could still spend together.

"I never considered leaving the team," Brown said. "The team is like my family now."

Luyt and Brown are both looking to pursue mechanical engineering in college — Brown at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology and Luyt at University of Michigan.

When he was in third grade, Luyt was on one of the first VEX Robotics teams in the region. He's always working on engineering projects — such as making a Halloween costume that doubled as a functioning arcade machine — and will now be looking for something to replace his high school robotics team upon graduating, he said.

"I've always been interested in engineering, but I never would have gotten that teamwork and leadership experience without robotics," Luyt said. "I certainly would not be anywhere close to my abilities as an engineer."

Brown said being on the team helped her better focus her interests in STEM as well as improve her public speaking and communication skills in doing presentations and outreach.

"I never really knew where I wanted to go with STEM, and then robotics introduced me to engineering and I fell in love with it," Brown said. "I'm going to be doing mechanical aerospace engineering next year. And I don't think I would be leaning in that direction if I wasn't in robotics."