M Go Blue Bots meet the Lego challenge

Drop in on an M Go Blue Bots practice any Sunday afternoon next fall, and you will observe a very unique kind of team - girls programming on laptops, girls building with Legos, girls debating the merits and demerits of a robot design, girls working to solve a research problem and girls laughing - laughing a lot.

The M Go Blue Bots is an all-girls robotics team that uses Lego Mindstorm kits to compete in the international First Lego League challenge issued every September with regional competitions taking place in mid-November. The annual challenge includes missions that robots must accomplish to earn points.

For this year's Ocean Odyssey theme, the M Go Blue Bots designed and programmed a robot to manipulate challenge pieces on an "oceanfront" playing field. The pieces, all made from Lego bricks, included a research vessel, a submarine, fish, a pipeline, and an artificial reef.

"I learned a lot about programming and designing the robot and what chassis would work best," said 11-year old Zoey Fuller from Ann Arbor Open School. Teammate 11 year-old Sarah Keller added, "I thought the programming was complicated at first. But, once I got the hang of it, it was pretty easy."

"Through the M Go Blue Bots program, we wanted to show girls that engineering, science and technology can be an exciting, collaborative, and challenging," says Dr. Cinda-Sue Davis, Director of the Women in Science and Engineering program, a sponsor of the M Go Blue Bots.

The M Go Blue Bots ended up 15th out of 35 teams at a regional competition in Flint. "The program was a success for more than its place in the regional," commented Jamie Saville, WISE Assistant Director. "Unlike many of the other teams in the competition, our girls were involved in every aspect of the competition."

"I was very proud that the M Go Blue Bots did so well since they were all a rookie team." Says parent John Mansfield.  "I was also very pleased that all the girls did all of the various jobs - everyone was a programmer, everyone did robot design, everyone did project presentation and research."

Saville credits the UM student coaches with the program's success. "We started out with ten girls ages 10-14, from different schools and backgrounds and five UM female engineering student coaches. And, due to the amazing UM student coaches, we ended up with a really amazing, cohesive engineering team."

"The coaches gave us a lot of encouragement, but they also gave us feedback about what wasn't working and what we needed to improve on, which is also good," said Fuller.

What's in store for the team now that their season is over? "Next year, we plan to expand participation on every level - with middle school students, with high school students, with university students, with parents and with our sponsors."

In addition to the WISE program, the M Go Blue Bots are sponsored by the University of Michigan's Center for Wireless Integrated Microsystems (WIMS), with additional sponsorship from the Altarum Institute, a nonprofit research and innovation institution in Ann Arbor and from Ann Arbor's Huron High School Robotics Team.

December 2005 eNews