PHOTOS BY GEORGE F. LEE / GLEE@STARBULLETIN.COM
Hilo High Robotics team members Keao Roseguo, left, Jade Miyashiro and Chester Lowrey looked intent on victory yesterday in the Hawaii regional FIRST Robotics Competition at the Stan Sheriff Center.
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Whiz kids engineer bright future
By Jaymes Song
Associated Press
Thinking about the future for Alicia Coates used to be limited to figuring out where her next meal would come from or locating a safe place to sleep.
Coates is now building robots and competing with some of the best young minds from across the nation with aspirations of owning her own business one day.
While 37 high school teams from as far away as Florida and New Jersey are competing in this weekend's Hawaii regional FIRST Robotics Competition, no team has been on a longer journey than SIATech, a public charter school from San Jose, Calif.
"I had no opportunities in the past," said Coates, a 20-year-old SIATech student who was homeless for six months last year in Sacramento, Calif. "I didn't have an interest in building robots and engineering and all that stuff. Now it's opened up a whole new world for me."
Coates and her teammates had all dropped out of traditional high schools at least once, and many, if not all, come from poor families. The teens have faced personal challenges to last a lifetime, ranging from drugs and gangs to neglect and violence.
One of the SIATech participants recently lost a friend in a drive-by shooting.
Today they have turned their lives around with the help of the robotics program and caring mentors.
"A lot of people look at them as 'at risk.' We see them as 'at promise,'" said Laurie Pianka, principal at SIATech. "Given the right support and the right environment, they can do anything."
The school is a partner with Job Corps, the nation's largest federal residential education and training program for disadvantaged youth. So some of the students live at school.
Despite a student body comprised of former dropouts, SIATech graduates a quarter of its students. However, it boasts a perfect graduation rate for students who have participated in the FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) robotics program, and some have moved and are pursuing careers from architecture to computer engineering.
PHOTOS BY GEORGE F. LEE / GLEE@STARBULLETIN.COM
Waiakea High Robotics team members Samuel Heinzen, left, Kelson Lau, Jordan Olive and Agyei Marshall guided their robot in the competition.
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"Some of our kids look a little tough, but they're just big kids," Pianka said. "They're so appreciative and excited. They're excited about getting on a plane. They're excited about having bars of soap in the hotel room. Everything is new and exciting."
While the wealthiest private schools in Hawaii are represented in the competition at the Stan Sheriff Center at the University of Hawaii, so are many schools from low-income or rural areas, such as Waialua and Waiakea, which have built two of the top programs.
Dale Olive, a mentor at Waiakea High School, said students used to be afraid to apply to college on the mainland because they thought they could not compete, but FIRST has given them the confidence and education they need.
FIRST, founded in 1989 by inventor Dean Kamen, teaches students about problem solving, teamwork, dedication, self-confidence and communication.
"They don't even know they're learning because they're having so much fun," said Alexander Ho, FIRST's regional director for Hawaii.
The schools compete for points and are judged on how well their robots can lift, carry and pass a ball while racing around a track. Six schools will advance to next month's FIRST Championship in Atlanta.
Gov. Linda Lingle helped bring the competition to Hawaii as part of her initiative to diversify the state's economy with high technology and encourage the fields of math, science and engineering. She also helped secure a $1 million grant from NASA to host the event for four years.