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Sanford Students Lead STEM Team to Robotics Victory

11/10/2014

On October 25th, Sanford seniors Sam Stevenson and Rebecca Goodier led the MOE 365 Robotics team to a first-place finish at the annual girlPOWER competition at Mt. Saint Joseph’s Academy.

Sixteen teams from the mid-Atlantic region competed in the event, which required all members of the robot’s “drive team” to be female. The “EliMOEnator,” MOE’s 2014 robot, is designed to compete against other robots in a series of games in which the robots pick balls up off the floor and catapult them into the air.

MOE, which stands for “Miracle of Engineering,” is a team of students, teachers, parents, and sponsors who collaborate to build a robot that will compete in the annual FIRST Robotics Competition. The team unites 44 students from 14 different schools in the Delaware region. At girlPOWER, Sam was MOE’s “driver”--the team member who controls where the robot goes on the playing field. Rebecca worked in the pit crew for the robot, helping to maintain and repair it after strenuous matches. The two Warriors were joined by students from the Charter School of Wilmington and Ursuline Academy. The MOE team finished the day in first place with an 11-1 record.

“I do feel as if the all-girls competition was worthwhile as it provided a venue to showcase the skill and prowess of many robotics-interested females across the area,” Sam said. “It is true that engineering is still a male-majority career field, and this opportunity provides an excellent way for these girls to be assured that their presence is needed and wanted.”

FIRST, an acronym for “For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology,” sponsors robotics competitions, enabling students from around the country to work on their projects alongside professionals and to hone engineering, leadership, and teamwork skills. The girlPOWER tournament was an off-season competition; the new season, which will bring a new challenge and require each team to design a new robot from scratch, will begin this January. Sam has been elected president of the 2015 team, and is looking forward to getting to work.

“This kind of opportunity is an exceptional opportunity to help and direct my team,” she explained. “I'm very optimistic about our upcoming season.”

You can read more about MOE’s accomplishments, view videos of their competitions, and follow their progress into the new season at their website: http://moe365.org.

Congrats to Sam, Rebecca and the whole MOE team!

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