Building a dream machine: Robotics program gains recognition, shows students how to apply lessons in the classroom to the real world

Grown-Haeberli, a Redwood City resident, used those attributes on the way to leading her all-girl team of robot makers to the For Inspiration and Recognition in Science and Technology, or FIRST, robotics challenge, where she won a Dean’s List award in front of nearly 18,000 attendees in St. Louis.

She was thrilled to receive the honor in front of such a momentous crowd of her friends, competition and colleagues, she said.

“It was really, really exciting,” she said.

The FIRST challenge gathered student innovators from across the globe to attend the a four-day competition in late April which allowed teams to battle their robots, built from reusable parts, in competitions such as those decided by which team can shoot balls into goals, and then moving goals into scoring areas.

To be selected to the Dean’s List, Grown-Haeberli demonstrated leadership and commitment to the program, made a contribution to her team and showed a commitment to entrepreneurship, creativity as well as an ability to motivate and lead fellow team members.

Grown-Haeberli said the program has developed all those characteristics, and more, while founding and leading the TigerBots team.

She said robotics has helped her apply lessons in science, technology, math and engineering that might be hard to comprehend, if she wasn’t able to view them through the lens of robot building.

“Sitting at school is great, and you learn a lot, but a lot of times kids don’t understand why skills are important,” she said. “This gives us a platform to understand our lessons.”

Grown-Haeberli, 17, founded the robotics program at Notre Dame High School after being the first girl to join the all-boys robot-building team at Serra High School.

She said working with the guys from Serra was at first challenging, but taught her to persevere through the fear and reluctance she may have initially had, on her way to eventually becoming part of the team.

“I was a little intimidated,” she said. “But I’m a pretty determined kid, so I push through it.”

After meeting an all-girls robotics team at Notre Dame High School in San Jose, Grown-Haeberli said she was inspired to try to introduce a similar team at her school.

She said the collaborative nature of the robot-building community gave her confidence that such a program would succeed in Belmont, and was pleased to see that her local school allowed the team to form.

“The school was really supportive,” she said.

Building the team of 15 girls has included a unique set of challenges, because members are committed to determining their own destiny, and not allowing parents or teachers to meddle in their decision-making.

Grown-Haeberli’s mother Tracey is the team’s coach, and said her greatest hurdle has been trying to keep parents away from influencing the team’s direction.

“The girls said they want to do things for themselves. They didn’t want adults doing things for them,” said Tracey Grown.

Grown-Haeberli said the experience has encouraged her to pursue robotics or engineering in the future, as she considers potential colleges and careers.

“I want to keep my options open,” she said. “But I really like this because I like problem-solving and I like building things.”

austin@smdailyjournal.com

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