Putting the pieces together

WILLIAMSBURG — The Williamsburg High School robotics team met Monday for a short practice before an impending snowstorm. They have limited time to prepare for their first elimination event in the FIRST Tech Challenge league tournament Jan. 20.

Found in 1989 by Dean Kamen, For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology is a global nonprofit organization that conducts team-based robotics programs for ages 4-18, including FIRST Lego League and FIRST Tech Challenge. Williamsburg High School students have participated since 2012. This year the BurgBots are a team of 10 working under coach Krystle Stehno, a high school math instructor.

Some of the team members participated in FIRST Lego League in elementary school, but any are new to robotics.

Baxter Koons, a junior, is lead programmer this year. He participated in robotics in 4-H and has been in FIRST Tech for three years. “My dad’s a design engineer for an appliance company,” Koons said. He started picking up on what his dad was doing and became interested in it.

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“I just like the fact that I can make something out of nothing,” said Koons. His creations do what he wants them to do, and he understands why.

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Senior Nathan Deeds is one of two team captains. “This is actually only my second year on the team,” said Deeds. He was busy with other interests in elementary school and in high school. “I do a lot of stuff for choir,” said Deeds. He made all-state last year.

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Deeds participated in speech, but school hasn’t offered that the last couple of year, he said. He’s competed in the Braille challenge — Deeds is legally blind — and was national champion a couple of years ago, he said.

Vision isn’t really an issue for him in robotics, said Deeds. He uses a screen reader and keyboard commands to talk to the computer, and other team members help him out, he said.

As team captain, Deeds coordinates and manages the activities of the team. He leads team meetings and makes sure each part of the team is on track to complete its duties.

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This year the outreach team was down several members, so Deeds has been helping there. He’s also the safety and compliance office and is tasked with staying up to date on all the regulations — and there are many.

Sam Lane is one of the team’s mentors. A 2021 graduate of Williamsburg High School, Lane was named to the FIRST Dean’s list and was supposed to go to Worlds in Detroit, but he didn’t get to go. He was not named one of the world’s top 10, but being in the top four in the state was amazing, said Stehno.

“I was pretty stocked about it,” said Lane. He came away with a backpack, a teddy bear and a water bottle.

Lane’s senior robotics season was “a tough year,” he said. “We still got to have a season, but it was fully remote.”

One of the big draws to FIRST is meeting other teams, he said.

Now a computer science major at Iowa State University, Lane said robotics saved him money. He’s set to graduate in three years rather than four. “I was able to test out of so many classes,” Lane said. “I enjoyed the headstart.

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Emily Rivera, a paraeducator, is assistant coach for the team. “I did robotics when I was in high school,” said the 2022 Williamsburg graduate. She joined on a whim because a friend wanted to join but didn’t want to be the only girl.

Rivera fit well. “I found my people in it,” said Rivera. Rivera was part of the outreach team which handles marketing and fundraising.

A season can cost $3,000-$5,000 between fees and parts,” said Lane. “We have to make it up ourselves.”

The team finds sponsors and has fundraisers, including an ongoing collection of cans and bottles.

Amelia Reed, a senior, is the second team caption. She also made the Dean’s list, in 2023.

Reed was reluctant to join robotics. She was reluctant to take computer classes. Not any more. Reed is headed to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Reed attended the Lutheran Interparish School through sixth grade and learned block programing and drag-and-drop programming in elementary school. It’s easier to understand than text is for younger students, she said.

As a freshman at Williamsburg High School, Reed was forced to take introduction to computers. “I couldn’t get out of it,” she said. “But I ended up really liking it.”

Reed hadn’t planned to apply for the robotics team because she thought everyone would be “way smarter than me.” But her sophomore year, a friend, Lauryn Venema, who graduated last year, thought robotics sounded like fun. The girls joined together.

Last year Reed was lead programmer, but she serves as team captain this year. On Monday, Reed was busy embroidering the team’s logo on a jacket on an industrial sewing machine purchased by the Family Career and Community Leaders of America. “They just got it this year,” said Reed, and she had to figure out how to make it work.

The machine came loaded with free designs, said Reed, but the team wanted its logo on the jackets, which serve as their uniforms.

Reed used the software included with the machine to digitize the logo and stitched samples until she made one she liked. She has to stitch designs on about 15 jackets before Jan. 20.

Reed likes the challenge robotics provides. She has to break down a task to figure out how to complete it. “It’s a good mental workout,” Reed said. “There’s a lot of creativity involved.”

Reed also likes the team atmosphere. It’s a perfect mix, she said.

Senior Devin Busch is the build lead. He has to make sure the robot is physically able to do what the challenge requires it to do. This year, robots have to pick up plastic pieces and put them on a board while navigating through an obstacle course.

Robots earn extra points if they can hang on the railings of the obstacle course at the end of the run, so the build team had to fashion gripping arms to accomplish that.

“I find it very interesting to do,” said Busch. He prefers the software part of robotics to the mechanical part, he said, but he’s been on the build team all four years of high school.

The first year the Williamsburg robot was more complex, said Busch. More of the parts were custom made.

This year the team purchased more of the parts. The parts perform more smoothly because they are made by professionals, Busch said. And though the premade parts cost more, the outreach team makes good money for the BurgBots.

The league in which Williamsburg competes has 19 teams from the Iowa City area through southeastern Iowa. After four competitions, the BurgBots are sixth, with 14 wins under their belt, said Deeds.

“That’s a pretty solid spot to be in going into the tournament,” said Deeds. “This will be our first elimination [event].”

Industrial Arts teacher Kevin Wilkinson started the Williamsburg team in 2012. In 2020, the team made marketing a priority, and Kaley Grimm created a new logo with the help of Stehno’s husband, Scott Kintzel, who works in the Kirkwood marketing department.

Claire Dickson is important for team recognition. She’s the student who dons a robot head and serves as team mascot during competitions.

“We want other teams to know us,” said Stehno.