Battlefield's robotic Bobcats take tech challenge

The object of the game at the First Tech Challenge was to gather racquet balls, stack crates and push around bowling balls, and do it all with a remotely controlled robot.

Battlefield High School fielded eight robotics teams in the competi­tion Saturday at the Annandale Cam­pus of Northern Virginia Community College, where hundreds of students made up more than two dozen teams to compete for rights to enter robots in the First Tech Challenge champi­onships in Richmond in March.

Gail Drake, an NVCC associate professor who also teaches engineering, robotics and program­ming at Battlefield High School, said she hopes the students gain insight into the engineering process while building and competing with the robots.

“What they get is the concept of the engineering process. They’ve already gone through the design phase, they’ve already gone through the testing phase and they’ve already tried to tweak out what works and what doesn’t work,” Drake said. 

The competition shows the students where their thought processes worked and maybe where they need to rethink, Drake said. 

Jacob Hogan, a member of Battlefield’s Team 194, said he plans a career in engineering so the exercise was good for him. 

“I hope to just learn a lot about engineering. It’s what I want to do,” the 17-year-old said. 

Jordan Soriano, 17, also of Team 194, said he was in it just to have fun. 

Melanie Sattler enjoyed the whole process. 

“You get to play with little electrical tools. You get to solder. You get to build something. That’s fun,” the 17-year-old Battlefield High student said. 

The program is meant to foster teamwork as well as encourage students interested in science, technology, engineering and math. 

Natalie Jones, 18, also of Team 194, said she was surprised how much she learned. 

“We really get a lot out of it — a lot more than I originally thought we would. It’s just a really great experience and a great program to be a part of,” the 18-year-old said. 

Dave Boyd, the vice president of operations for Lorenz Research out of McLean and mentor for Team 194, said he hopes the program encourages students to consider careers in engineering. 

He said his company needs the technically inclined. “I hope what these kids get is to be inspired to pursue careers in engineering because frankly I’m in the engineering field and I can’t hire enough of them. I want them to get the skills that we can use in today’s technology society,” he said. 

A team from Sidwell Friends in Washington D.C. took first place at the competition and Team 392 from Battlefield High placed second. 

Both winners will be headed to Richmond for the finals. 

Senior reporter Keith Walker can be reached at 703-369-6751.