2015 Oakland County Competitive Robotics Association

Rochester Adams High School – Team 245

Foundation Award Entry

Team 245, the Rochester Adams High School Robotics team, benevolently submits our entry for the 2015 OCCRA Foundation Award. We believe we are an exceptional team and deserve your consideration for this prestigious award as illustrated below.

Team History with OCCRA:

The AdamBots have been competing in OCCRA since the league formed in 2000.  At Rochester Adams High School, robotics is considered a club activity and therefore everything is done after school. Our school does not have a regular work facility so we build our robot in the Computer Aided Design teacher’s work closet. Like other teams, we meet after school and occasionally on weekends to complete the design, CAD, build, and programming of our robot.

Our OCCRA season has been used previously to introduce our new students to robotics. However, beginning this year, the OCCRA team is now separate from our FIRST team. The OCCRA team now consists of students who have experienced at least one season of FIRST. Students have the choice to be on both teams, or just one. The role of OCCRA has changed as well. The team uses the EDGE method of mentoring which consists of Explaining, Demonstrating, Guiding, and Enabling the students on the team. OCCRA is the Enable phase of this method. The FIRST students work on OCCRA as an independent project. Most of these students will then go on to be subteam leaders in the FIRST season. While the underclassmen are not permitted on the OCCRA team, we do encourage them to take part in cheering at competitions and support our team as a whole.

Teamwork, Cooperation, and Enthusiasm:

The AdamBots are always up and cheering on our team as well as our competitors. From the beginning to the end of each competition, the AdamBots are helping out and cheering. After each competition, we stay to help tear down the field and move the materials to the trailer. We choose this OCCRA assignment each season because we have a large team and we can help get everyone home from the competitions a bit faster by pitching in to get the job done. Last year, the AdamBots hosted the first OCCRA competition at Adams High School and helped set up the field, in addition to our normal tear down support.

All team members from the OCCRA team, in participation with the FIRST team, are required to participate in at least two service activity during the fall season. This year we participated in our own Hunger Walk for Rochester Area Neighborhood House, cleaned-up at the Halloween Hoot Event at Dinosaur Hill, and raised money for Relay for Life through our walk and scavenger hunt. Again this year, the AdamBots will be participating in Rochester Holiday parade. We also participate as a team in the Relay for Life Cancer walk in the summer. Continuing this year, the AdamBots are mentoring STEM classes for kindergarten to second grade students, running FLL teams at the local elementary schools, as well as continuing to support the FTC team at Van Hoosen.

To raise the funds for the entry fee and to build our robots for OCCRA, we used some of the money from the Arts and Apples parking lot business we run in September. We are a self-funded team since we do not receive funds from the school system.

At the OCCRA Diversity Tournament, our girls helped out many teams. We have a dedicated time for every girl on our team to drive so they are prepared to help out. This year, many of our girls were able to be on the field as a driver, human player, or coach for our team or another OCCRA team. This was a great experience for us and the enthusiasm of the girls could be felt throughout the competition.

Technical and Academic Disciplines and Problem Solving:

At the beginning of the OCCRA season, many of the team members attended the OCCRA kick-off to learn about this year’s game.  The team then quickly got to work on a strategy and design. In past years, OCCRA was split between the experienced students and the new students. The experienced students were assigned the task of building and programming the robot. The new students would go through an extensive training program where they work on other robots to learn how they function and how they are built. However, because our team now consists of only veteran students, the entire team participates in working on the robot, board, and Foundation Award.

This year, the team has two mentors: Mr. Hildebrandt and Mrs. Alspach. They have been mentoring robotics teams for 18 and 2 years,respectively. While OCCRA is mainly student run, our mentors are active members of our team, supporting us in all of our endeavors. They stay after school for 4 hours everyday to ensure we are safe while building our robot as well as for guidance 1 hour a week. Furthermore, Mr. Hildebrandt and Mrs. Alspach manage all the craziness that goes into our team and guide us to a successful season. Mr. Hildebrandt’s engineering knowledge is invaluable to our build season, while Mrs. Alspach’s business experience and organization is indispensable.

Safety First:

Every student on our team has their own pair of safety glasses and is asked to bring them to all events. Extra pairs are available at the entrance to the build room for those who might not have theirs or for parents who stop in to see just how the robot that is put out at every competition is made.  

All sharp edges on the robot are filed down by students to reduce the chance of small cuts. Our amazing mentor, Mr. Hildebrandt, is always there to make sure we are being safe.

OCCRA Successes for the AdamBots:

As a team, we have experienced success in OCCRA in the past fifteen years as shown by the many OCCRA trophies displayed at our school. We have won the OCCRA Championships five times and the Foundation Award four times. The AdamBots are the defending champions this year, and so far, have come in first, second, and third place at each of the competitions. We are very excited for the Championships this year!

Continuing the Journey:

The AdamBots participate in OCCRA because it is a great way to get those students who are passionate about engineering to be able to experience it in an independent setting and get them excited about robotics before the FIRST season begins. The ability to bring the robot back to school after a competition to make adjustments, mostly based on experience, is fantastic. It is a great way for new members to start their journey in the field of robotics, without the cost and pressure of the district, state, and worldwide FIRST events.  

The Adambots will continue our journey to make improvements every year. We will continue to provide the opportunities for our students to learn about opportunities in science and technology, through hands-on experiences. We work hard on creating a strong foundation for future members.

We know that the process is working based on the number of alumni of the program who come back to visit us. OCCRA has made an impact on their lives and will continue to impact the lives of our current students.

Thanks for reading about our team.