Storming Robots

Simple Walking Lego Robot

The 8 Queens Puzzle with Arduino and Adafruit 8x8 Matrix Display

Storming Robots
Type	Robotics Engineering Learning institution for Grade 4 to 12
Director/Founder	Elizabeth Mabrey (Member of International Technical Committee of RobocupJunior)
Chief of Technology Development	Dennis Mabrey
Established	2005
Students	Over 200 in the Fall of 2013
Location	Branchburg, New Jersey
Colors	Navy, Gray, and Black
Newspaper	The Loose Gears (student-run) Established in 2011.
Website	www.stormingrobots.com
Telephone	908-595-1010
Fax	855-595-1010

Storming Robots is Robotics and Technology Learning Lab based in Branchburg, New Jersey. All of Storming Robots' programs are modeled to build and strengthen problem solving, computational and algorithmic thinking skills, and reinforce the engineering process. They use robotics as means to inspire children's interest and further their intellect in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) and also analytic, computational, and strategic thinking. ^[1][2]

Programs

The programs at Storming Robots focus on educating grade school students in robotics with stress in software automation and algorithms. It was founded by Elizabeth Mabrey, who left her software development career to create an application-based model education using robotics. She hoped to help filling the void of engineering among grade school students.^[2] It utilizes curriculum designed by renowned robotics institutions, such as the Carnegie Mellon University Robotics Academy and the Robotics Educator Projects by NASA. Students usually use the Lego Mindstorms NXT platforms as well as Arduino open platform. Both visual programming environments, such as LabVIEW and RoboLab, and traditional, text-based programming languages, including RobotC, C, C++, and Java, are used to write software.

A diagram of the skills taught in the Roboclub at Storming Robots

Year Round Robotics Education for Grade 3+ - Roboclub Technology Club

^[3]

Storming Robots' Roboclub Technology Club groups students with similar abilities, not by grade levels. This along with the application-based oriented robotics projects seem to be the most important key which attracts enrollment. This school year program breaks into three terms, each running for three months. Then it is followed by 2 months of a summer workshops period.

Storming Robots's Roboclub slowly gained its reputation within the small community mainly through words of mouth, and its students' robotics tournament accomplishment. SR selected students the school year robotic programs to form competitive teams. They have competed on both national and international level.

Storming Robots students returning rate is high; and many treated it like their second home. The students have even started publishing their own newspaper three times a year to highlight the experiences and accomplishments of the center. That also encourages all students to turn in their articles in order to encourage writing skills among the engineering-inclined students.

It was rather unique that the center also helps his student to provide assistance to the Special Needs as well. During the winter of 2013, one of Storming Robots' roboclub students held a series of robotics workshops for the Special Needs for free.^[4]

GreenBot is a GPS-guided racing robot powered by Lego MINDSTORMS NXT.

Other Workshops

^[2] It usually holds weekly themed-based summer workshops. Their summer programs focus on problem solving and analysis, mathematical applications with robotics engineering, from mechanical building to automation with robotic software programming. All hands-on projects are exercised with an engineering process.^{[5] [6]}

Competition

The Storming Robots teams have left mark in several robotics competitions, MIT/NASA ZeroRobotics Satellites Automation Competition,^[7] and the International RobocupJunior.^[8]

They have obtained high achievements in various robotics tournaments throughout the years. They have been featured in the town's local newspaper throughout the years. Its middle school and high school roboclub students have continuously won in both USA and World Tournament. In 2013, its team won representing the United States won World Title in the RoboCupJunior World Championship competition in Mexico City during June 2013.^[9]

Storming Robots have about 10 to 15 teams participated in RobocupJunior since 2012.^[10] Elizabeth Mabrey, the founder of Storming Robots, has always been the Head Coach, but she often coaches some of her most outstanding high school students mentor-ship so that they can take on mentoring role themselves. Since the Fall of 2012, she has also been the active member of the International Robocupjunior Committee for the Rescue League. The Technical Committee members are responsible for creating technical rules for the competitions.^[11]

The Computing Olympiad

Students who participate in this competition possess superb software/algorithmic programming skill. USACO USA Computing Olympiad is part of the International Olympiad in Informatics program, which is very well-known and highly regarded at an international level.^[12]

ZeroRobotics

Students write algorithms for satellites aboard the International Space Station in the MIT/NASA ZeroRobotics National SPHERES Challenge. ^[13]

Along with alliance teams from River Hill High School and Rockledge High School, Storming Robots' high school team won the SPHERES Challenge 2011 on the International Space Station. Their software was loaded to run the Spheres micro-robots on board the ISS as part of the competition.

2013

In December 2013, its team name Quark Charm advanced to the ISS-Final Robotics Competition hosted by MIT/NASA.^[14][15]

2012

Forming the all-rookie team for 2012 were Michael Xie, Andrew Amerman, Sid Kurella, Sunny Aggarwal, Sahil Pathare, and Andre Gou, all of whom were in ninth grade. The team made it to semi-finals, but, unfortunately, the signal required for the 3D triangulation algorithm was distorted by cosmic noise, severely complicating the process.^[16]

2011

SR's high school team, along with alliance teams from River Hill High School and Rockledge High School, it won the SPHERES Challenge 2011 on the International Space Station. Their software was loaded to run the Spheres micro-robots on board the ISS as part of the competition.^[17][18]

2010

SR's first year participation in ZeroRobotics. This was the only team from New Jersey in 2010.^[19][20]

RobocupJunior (RCJ)

RobocupJunior is at the grade school level of RoboCup, an international, artificial-intelligence-oriented robotics tournament. It emphasizes autonomous robotics and algorithmic programming. Each year, each country holds a competition divided into three leagues: soccer, rescue, and dance. Storming Robots participates in the first two competitions every year. The top teams from each country are invited to compete at the international level. Several countries bid to host RoboCup each year.^[21]

2013

The competition was held at Liberty Science Center on April 14. Storming Robots won first place in RoboSoccer, first and third places in Robo-Rescue B, first, second, and third places in Robo-Rescue A, and second place in Robo-Dance.

The world division was held in Eindhoven, Netherlands. The 1st Place SuperTeam World Champion award in the RoboDance Primary League was won by Storming Robots' Team Visionaries. The 2nd Place Individual Team Technical World Champion in the RoboDance Primary League was also Team Visionaries. The Best Technical Presentation Award in the RoboRescue A Primary League went to Storming Robots' Team ShimoZumo. There were also three additional teams from Storming Robots:

• RoboSoccer / Secondary - Team Dimensions entered Quarter-Final
• RoboRescue B - Team SR-chitects dived in some interesting AI-oriented algorithms
• RoboRescue A Primary - Team SeedZ demonstrated great team work

^[21]

Michael Xie waves the flag of the USA at the 2012 RobocupJunior world event in Mexico City.

2012

At the USA RobocupJunior Tournament, Storming Robots' teams again won 1st place in several categories and invited to the World RobocupJunior Event;^[21] including Rescue-A/Primary, Rescue-B/Secondary,^[22] and Soccer/Primary.

Storming Robots took first place in the dance league at the 2012 RobocupJunior World Championships in Mexico City.

Storming Robots took third place in the soccer league at the 2012 RobocupJunior World Championships in Mexico City.

Storming Robots teams took first place in three out of seven leagues in the Robo-Rescue A Primary League. The event was held on April 22 at Liberty Science Center. Two teams from Storming Robots, Team Zulu and Dimensions, won world titles for the USA at the world event in Mexico City, Mexico. The Dimensions Team was mentored by Storming Robots' roboclub high school member, Avery Katko.^[21]

During the same year, Storming Robots' high school team, with its alliance team, won the MIT/NASA 2012 ZeroRobotics USA Championship.^[23]

2011

The competitions in 2011 were held at Orange High School in New Jersey instead of the Hall of Science. Storming Robots won first, second, and third places in Robo-Rescue. One Robo-Rescue A team was invited to the international division in Istanbul, Turkey and ranked 17th out of 30+ teams.^[21]

2010

Teams from Storming Robots won first, second, and third place in Robo-Rescue on April 11 at the New York Hall of Science. Although Storming Robots was invited to participate in the World Tournament in Singapore, due to the high cost and inconvenient timing of the trip, the team declined.^[21]

2009

The event was held on May 3 at the New York Hall of Science. Four of nine teams from Storming Robots won first, second, and third places in Robo-Rescue and second place in the RoboSoccer event. A six-student team moved onto the international level at Graz, Austria as a team and competed against other students of the similar age from over 30 different nations, including China, Japan, and Germany.^[24]

2008

This was Storming Robots' first year participating in RCJ, and there were only two teams.^[25]

FIRST Lego League (from 2005 to 2011)

While Storming Robots does not have teams for the FIRST Robotics Competition and FIRST Tech Challenge leagues, beginning in 2005, Storming Robots began sending teams of students to the FIRST Lego League. Storming Robots withdrew from participation in FLL beginning in 2011 because the program did not align with Storming Robots' goals of teaching students to use artificial intelligence, which is stressed heavily by RoboCup. Students also displayed disinterest in making posters and presentations; they were looking for activities in contrast to assignments in school.

^[26][27]

Newspaper

Started in January 2011, the center's first newspaper group was estimated. It is a student-run newspaper, named the Loose Gears, journals the latest happenings at Storming Robots. The newspaper facilitates an opportunity for all students to turn his or her thoughts into writing.^[28]

Projects

Storming Robots has a group on LinkedIn to facilitate the discussion of cost-friendly projects, which can range from simple to sophisticated. One is about cross-platform robotic communication named "Multi-agent Educational Projects" (see external link).

See also

1. RobotC
2. RoboCup Junior
3. SPHERES
4. USA Computing Olympiad
5. FIRST Lego League

External links

1. Official website
2. The RobocupJunior NY/NJ
3. The Global RobocupJunior Site
4. Multi-agent Educational Projects Group on LinkedIn
5. Frequently Asked Questions and Parents Testimonial
6. Lego Engineering
7. The Robotics Academy at Carnegie Mellon University
8. ROBOTC Multi-Robot project by the Carnegie Mellon University Robotics Academy
9. Technology Interactions 2003
10. The TECHKnow Project: High School: Student Edition 2
11. Technology and Engineering Curriculum Review
12. College House Books
13. NASA Press Release for 2011 SPHERES Challenge Winners

References