Sunlake students test out robot

Darien Carter punched the buttons and watched the balls fly.
One by one, they bounced off of their goals.

"Aw, yeah! That's what I'm talking about!" said Darien, a junior at Sunlake High School. "It's like a video game or something. That's awesome."

Darien had stayed after school Wednesday to watch a demonstration by Team Duct Tape, a group of high school students from Pasco and Hillsborough counties that has advanced to the For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology World Championship April 14 to 17 at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta.

The team is based in Odessa. Its members in September started building the cube-shaped 18-by-18-by-18-inch robot, which scoops up whiffle balls by rolling over them and then launches them at targets.

Team Duct Tape took first place at a statewide competition at the University of South Florida in February, said Terri Willingham, the team's coach. Two teams from each state can qualify for the FIRST World Championship, which also includes teams from Brazil, China and Europe.
Ironically, the other Florida team is Smoke and Mirrors, also based in Odessa.

"Half the kids on our team have never done robotics before," Willingham said, "but they came together as a team."

In competition, robots can ram each other and pin one another against barriers.

"There are four robots on the field at once," said Joel Croteau, a 10th-grader at Sunlake and member of Team Duct Tape. "They try to collect the balls and shoot them in goals, either on- or off-field. Whoever gets the most balls in the goals wins."

Other judging criteria includes subjective scoring on things such as how well the team does when interviewed by competition officials, as well as the team's appearance. Team Duct Tape has its own T-shirts as well as black-and-white fedoras made from duct tape.

At Sunlake on Wednesday, team members watched as Sunlake students took turns moving the robot and shooting balls.

"We use a Bluetooth connection and a special robotics (computer) program for juniors," said Chris Kujawa, 16, a Team Duct Tape member who is home-schooled in Lutz. "This is our second version of the robot and we're just fine-tuning it" for the world championship.

Making the robot and presenting it at various competitions isn't cheap, nor is the cost of getting team members and their families to Atlanta in a couple of weeks. Fortunately, said Willingham, several area businesses sponsor the team in return for side-of-the-robot advertising that is affixed with - you guessed it - duct tape.

Melodie Oleson, media specialist at Sunlake High, said the school is in the early stages of forming its own robotics team.

"This will give our kids a glimpse of what they can do if they use their brains," she said.
It seemed to work.

A couple of dozen students stayed after school to watch the demonstration, which even inspired one girl to shoot cell phone footage.

Jay Fernandez, a 10-grader at Sunlake, smiled after his turn maneuvering the robot and shooting balls.

"This s pretty cool," he said. "Things like this have interested me a lot since I was a little kid. This could inspire me to go on to bigger things."

TEAM DUCT TAPE
To learn more about Team Duct tape, visit www.TeamDuctTape.com.