BonnerSprings.com

The Bonner Springs YMCA gymnasium was taken over by robots Saturday.

The trials for the first Search and Rescue Robot Challenge began that morning, with more than 20 teams, including several from China, Connecticut and central Kansas.

Each of the teams had three trials to prove its programming savvy in getting its robot to find a blinking light in a 8-foot-by-8-foot area studded with a dozen small pylons and other obstacles.

Teams mostly had the same kind of robot, each of which had to navigate the same kind of course autonomously, starting out at a point chosen by a judge. Each robot had 3 minutes to find the light. The exercise is intended to simulate a disaster site, in which a robot might be deployed to search for survivors, either to lead rescue workers or to bring food and water.

In addition to the pylons, which were held in place by cans of food, the search areas included black sheets of construction paper meant to simulate holes the robots couldn't cross, and a black boundary line at the perimeter.

A robot is disqualified for that trial if it crosses the "hole" or goes outside the search area, said Steve Waddell, CEO of the educational software company I Support Learning and the main organizer of the event. He said because a search-and-rescue robot that went out side the area that rescuers needed to search would be useless, as would be one that destroyed itself by falling down a hole.

Among the teams competing Saturday, and winner of the middle-school field, was the team from Guidance Academy of Technology and Pre-engineering, in Kansas City, Mo.

Abdimalik Mohamud, a sophomore at North Kansas City Kansas High School, said he learned "a lot" about programming in preparation for the event. Abdimalik said he wanted to be an engineer when he grows up, and to work on robots that perform exactly the kind of real-life tasks that Saturday's competition trials were meant to simulate.

"I want to do search-and-rescue robots," Abdimalik said.

One robot that stood out from the retro-looking robots in use by most teams was the iRobot, which the team from Buhler High School, in Buhler, Kan., was using. The iRobot looked something like a Roomba automatic vacuum cleaner, but with metal scaffolding holding circuit boards and a handheld video-game console for programming on the top.

At first the team was having problems with the robot before the competition, said Cristine Warring, a math teacher at Buhler and a former computer programmer who mentors the team. The iRobot requires an old computer language, C, that many of the team members were unfamiliar with. Because their chief programmer couldn't make it to the day's events, the team had difficulty during their first trial.

Still, by late morning the Buhler team had the iRobot going and was working out the kinks to get it to avoid the black paper meant to simulate holes.

"It's pretty hard," said team member Isaiah Clark, describing the programming language as "hard-core."

"This is extremely valuable" as an educational experience, Warring said. "I'd like to see it (robotics competitions) take hold in central Kansas."

She said the competition was valuable, because "it's not about whether they're smart," but it teaches them problem-solving skills, perseverance to work through problems, and teamwork.

Ying-Jie Xin, director and vice president of Grandar Robotics, one of the event's sponsors, said his company got involved with the event organized by Waddell because "we found nobody else was doing it."

"We found that robots are the best stage for (teaching) technology education," Ying-Jie said with the help of a translator. "It will make students interested in learning and technology."

Grandar was also sponsoring in part the Chinese teams' trip to the United States. The teams came from Beijing, Shanghai, Guanzhou, and Guangxi.

"Some of them prepared late last night, until 2 this morning," Ying-Jie said.

Yu Jian Feng, one of the students on the Jin Shan team from Shanghai, said his robot did "not too bad" in the morning's first trial.

Besides the competition, Yu said the trip so far had been good, having arrived the day before.

"It's a beautiful country," Yu said. "American people are so nice."

One of the captains of the two Bonner Springs teams, senior Joe Bland, said he and his teammates had a good time even if they didn't win or place.

"All things considered we didn't do all that bad - we may not have won or gotten in the top three, but we did our best and we had some fun," Bland said. "It was a blast. We had some laughs at our own expense, but that was to be expected only having two weeks to work on the project."

After trying a new program devised by a teammate, "we ended up just modifying and re-modifying the same program the day of the competition," Bland said.

The participation of the Chinese teams also added to the fun, Bland said.

"Even though there was a language and culture barrier, if someone made a joke or did something funny it really didn't matter," Bland said. "The joke was there and everyone could understand."

The following are the results for the first annual Search and Robotics Competition: Top U.S. high school team, Ghamas Kombat, from the Greater Hartford Academy of Math and Science, Hartford, Conn.; Top U.S. middle school team, Guidance Academy 2, from the Guidance Academy, Kansas City, Mo.; Top international high school team, Fireman, from Shanghai; and Top international middle school team, Dragon 1, from Shanghai.

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