FRC team 3161
Well before winning the Gracious Professionalism award in the World FIRST Robotics Championships in Texas in April, our own Holy Trinity Catholic Secondary School's (HTCSS) robotics team received the First Impact Award at the district-level event at Barrie.
What sets the First Impact Award apart is that it recognized the HTCSS team's inspiring community-building work in addition to excelling at its own creation for the first time ever.
"The First Impact Award is different from others because it's all about spreading values that embodies the mission of First Canada," says Mr. Roger Balech, Lead Mentor of First Robotics Competition (FRC) Team 3161, also known as Tronic Titans.
"We won this award at the district level event at Georgian College, which qualified us for the provincial championships. And we performed really well at the provincial level to qualify for the World Championship."
According to FIRST, the world's leading non-profit organization advancing STEM education among the youth, "the FIRST Impact Award (formerly Chairman's Award) is the most prestigious award at FIRST, it honors the team that best represents a model for other teams to emulate and best embodies the mission of FIRST."
FRC Team 3161 helped build the robotics team at St. Ignatius of Loyola Catholic Secondary School, Oakville.
"Our goal has always been to start other robotics teams at our school board and the Loyola team performed exceptionally well at the provincial level," Mr Balech, the mentor for the last 13 years, stated.
One of his students also created an electrical schematic for connecting all the electronic components of the robot, and this was included in the kit that was given to all the rookie teams worldwide.
Sebastian Nava Urribarri, a student of grade 11 and member of FRC Team 3161, aspires to pursue electrical or computer engineering at the University of Waterloo.
"We use the resources available to us to try to make a difference in our community and empower students enrolled in the program," says Urribarri. "Sharing our knowledge with another local school and being able to see first-hand how inspirational this program is, was an unforgettable experience."
FRC Team 3161 is further divided into sub-teams like mechanical, programming, business, and so on, with leads taking charge of each sub-team for smooth operations. This structure allows every student to participate.
Urribarri was the electrical and awards lead for this season and made sure that the robot's wiring was working well and that all mechanical components had power. The awards sub-team also wrote various essays for team awards and helped to present the team during competitions to multiple judges.
