Houghton robotics team advances to nationals

HOUGHTON — The Houghton Superior Roboworks team has qualified for the Championship Event in St. Louis and will compete against 600 teams from around the world.

The annual competition is put on by FIRST, or For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology, a group whose mission is to encourage young people to become leaders in those fields. This is the second year in a row the team has earned a trip to the final round.

Houghton High School Senior Peter Lund said, “I think the people on the team this team and last year have just been really phenomenally hard working and, you know, really care about the club and are willing to put the time in.  We work 21 hours a week, every week, for about a month and a half.”

This year’s robot will be put to the test as it tries to outperform designs by other teams by stacking totes on top of a step to score points. But regardless whether the robot is triumphant…these students are already winners because of what they get out of the experience.

Houghton High School Freshman Danielle Lund said, “It’s helped me with skills of, like, communicating because not only do you have to communicate with people that you’ve been working with for months building a robot, but also when you go to the competition, you have to strategize with other teams and, of course, the engineering, which I just love.  I love building.”

Team 857 has already had a very successful year…winning the Excellence in Engineering award at the Escanaba District Competition and the Industrial Design Award at the Kentwood District Competition.

Now it’s off to St. Louis where they could come home world champions.