Robotics Team Plays With Heart
After competing successfully in the Dallas county tournament late in the fall at the University of Texas at Dallas, St. Mark’s BEST robotics team carried their robot to the Southwest Regional Championships in Austin for their first time to compete against teams from Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas. In addition to finishing third in the Dallas county competition by beating out many large public and private schools in the area, the Marksmen robot also won the prestigious “Most Elegant” engineering design.
The BEST program is a sports-like competition where high school students build a remote-controlled robot designed to accomplish a given task. Several restrictions apply to help make the competition simulate a “real world” business and engineering environment. The students build their robots in a given time frame and must meet specific design requirements (size, weight, etc.) from a prescribed set of components.
The enthusiastic 10-member team and their coaches, St. Mark’s Science teachers Doug Rummel and Paul Hoehn, prepared for the regional competition where this year’s task involved retrieving and then placing balloons into team bins. Following several early successful rounds, the Marksmen robot won the fourth round but was forced into a replay of the round. During the replay, the Marksmen robot was attacked by another robot and became entangled with that opponent’s mechanical arm. After some debate among the judges and several of the teams, the Marksmen discovered that their hopes for the semi-finals had been lost due to the entanglement.
Although disappointment loomed large, the Marksmen quickly realized that they had a greater purpose. A team from Austin Academy had befriended the Marksmen team earlier in the competition and provided technical help on some power issues, even keeping some of the Marksmen robot batteries on ice to increase the endurance of the St. Mark’s team. Somewhat inspired by the newfound friendship, the Marksmen team decided they would develop a strategy they called “Die for the Hive,” and come to the aid of the Austin Academy team whose robot was damaged and wasn’t going to make the semifinals. So in the last round the Marksmen team pulled all of their balloons and surprised everyone by depositing them in the Austin Academy bin, thereby giving their peer team the points they needed to make the semifinals. Even one of the judges came up to the St. Mark’s team and said “You realize that’s not your bin.” The boys just smiled and said they knew exactly what they were doing.
Austin Academy went on to finish in the top 8 and the Marksmen team demonstrated the real value of teamwork, sportsmanship and maturity, inspiring all who were lucky enough to attend the event. The St. Mark’s team was led by co-captains Mark Stevens ’05 and Justin Perkins ’04. Other members of the team were Alex St. Claire ’04, Matt Feldman ’05, Tanvir Suri ’04, Brett Moffitt ’05, Denis Lin ’04, Zack Morrison ’07, Charles Lena ’06, Peter Yen ’06 and Dave Player ’07. St. Mark’s alumnus Jon Agnich ’98 served as the team’s engineering mentor. Jon now works for Texas Instruments in the Mobile Infrastructure Group developing wireless devices.
Congratulations to these fine young Marksmen (and their faculty sponsors) for playing with heart.
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The BEST program is a sports-like competition where high school students build a remote-controlled robot designed to accomplish a given task. Several restrictions apply to help make the competition simulate a “real world” business and engineering environment. The students build their robots in a given time frame and must meet specific design requirements (size, weight, etc.) from a prescribed set of components.
The enthusiastic 10-member team and their coaches, St. Mark’s Science teachers Doug Rummel and Paul Hoehn, prepared for the regional competition where this year’s task involved retrieving and then placing balloons into team bins. Following several early successful rounds, the Marksmen robot won the fourth round but was forced into a replay of the round. During the replay, the Marksmen robot was attacked by another robot and became entangled with that opponent’s mechanical arm. After some debate among the judges and several of the teams, the Marksmen discovered that their hopes for the semi-finals had been lost due to the entanglement.
Although disappointment loomed large, the Marksmen quickly realized that they had a greater purpose. A team from Austin Academy had befriended the Marksmen team earlier in the competition and provided technical help on some power issues, even keeping some of the Marksmen robot batteries on ice to increase the endurance of the St. Mark’s team. Somewhat inspired by the newfound friendship, the Marksmen team decided they would develop a strategy they called “Die for the Hive,” and come to the aid of the Austin Academy team whose robot was damaged and wasn’t going to make the semifinals. So in the last round the Marksmen team pulled all of their balloons and surprised everyone by depositing them in the Austin Academy bin, thereby giving their peer team the points they needed to make the semifinals. Even one of the judges came up to the St. Mark’s team and said “You realize that’s not your bin.” The boys just smiled and said they knew exactly what they were doing.
Austin Academy went on to finish in the top 8 and the Marksmen team demonstrated the real value of teamwork, sportsmanship and maturity, inspiring all who were lucky enough to attend the event. The St. Mark’s team was led by co-captains Mark Stevens ’05 and Justin Perkins ’04. Other members of the team were Alex St. Claire ’04, Matt Feldman ’05, Tanvir Suri ’04, Brett Moffitt ’05, Denis Lin ’04, Zack Morrison ’07, Charles Lena ’06, Peter Yen ’06 and Dave Player ’07. St. Mark’s alumnus Jon Agnich ’98 served as the team’s engineering mentor. Jon now works for Texas Instruments in the Mobile Infrastructure Group developing wireless devices.
Congratulations to these fine young Marksmen (and their faculty sponsors) for playing with heart.
St. Mark’s School of Texas
10600 Preston Road
Dallas, Texas 75230
214-346-8000
Dallas, Texas 75230
214-346-8000
About Us
St. Mark’s School of Texas is a private, nonsectarian college-preparatory boys’ day school for students in grades 1 through 12, located in Dallas, Texas. St. Mark’s aims to prepare young men to assume leadership and responsibility in a competitive and changing world.
St. Mark’s does not discriminate in the administration of its admission and education policies on the basis of race, color, religion, sexual orientation, or national or ethnic origin.
St. Mark’s does not discriminate in the administration of its admission and education policies on the basis of race, color, religion, sexual orientation, or national or ethnic origin.
