St. Clair Middle School Robotics team wins state qualifier – Port Huron Times Herald

St. Clair Middle School students Spencer Hack, left, Andrew Parr, Raine Caister, Quinn Schwarz and Mitchell Hack won a qualifying tournament for the Michigan Robofest Championships.(Photo: Bob Gross, Times Herald)Buy Photo

ST. CLAIR A Robofest team from St. Clair Middle School took first place in a Lego robotics competition March 18 at Baldwin Elementary School in Rochester.

"I've got eight different teams and one of the teams competed last Saturday and took a first place," said ScottP. Eisele, a technology teacher at St. Clair Middle School and St. Clair High School.

"They scored two perfect rounds."

A Robofest team at St. Clair Middle School won a qualifier for the state championship games. Bob Gross, Times Herald

The competition was a qualifier for the Michigan State Robofest Championship, May 13 at Lawrence Technological University in Southfield.

Members of the Saints 1 team that won at Rochester are Andrew Parr, 13, an eighth-grader;Raine Caister, 13, a seventh-grader; Quinn Schwarz, 13, an eighth-grader; Spencer Hack, 13, an eighth-grader; and Mitchell Hack, 12, a seventh-grader.

"I was pretty excited," Andrew said. "It was a smaller competition, probably one of our smallest competitions."

Raine said being in robotics requires teamwork: "You have to work together. If you don't work together, you'll never get done."

St. Clair MIddle School teacher Scott Eisele, right, works with Connor Lobeck, center, and Carter Sharrow on a robot programming issue.(Photo: Bob Gross, Times Herald)

Eisele said he has 31 studentsin the robotics program at St. Clair Middle School. The other seven teams will be competing April 22 at West Bloomfield High School. He also has seven students at the high school on two teams.

Students competing in Robofest build their robots from Legos and other materials. Unlike in other robotics competitions, there are no drivers each robotmust be autonomous and complete its task without input from team members beyond programming.

This year's game is based on baseball. Once it's switched on, the robot must clear a field of the bases and any debris, then smack a ball off a tee and over a wall.

Eisele said the students do the work and the students get the benefits.

"No. 1, they are learning to program, writing code for the robots," he said. "The robots have to run autonomously.

Andrew Parr tweaks his team's robot at St. Clair Middle School.(Photo: Bob Gross, Times Herald)

"They have to design the robot. Pretty much every team has different ideas on how they can solve the problems.

"And once the robot starts on the mission, you can't touch the robot," he said.

Students meet at the middle school before classes in the morning to work on their robots and tweak the programming. Eisele said because many of the robots use light sensors, even small variations can throw off their performance.

"It's fun and it's also challenging," said Connor Lobeck, who is 13 and a seventh-grader. "Sometimes your program doesn't want to work and you have to change a few things about it to get it to work."

St. Clair Middle School teacher Scott Eisele talks with Connor Lobeck about his robot.(Photo: Bob Gross, Time Herald)

Nick Murawski, 13 and a seventh-grader, said he likes the hands-on aspects of Robofest.

"I like it because it's interesting and it helps me understand parts of engineering," he said. "We have to build this robot ourselves with no instruction."

More:Students prepare for Robofest

Contact Bob Gross at (810) 989-6263 or rgross@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @RobertGross477

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St. Clair Middle School Robotics team wins state qualifier - Port Huron Times Herald