Home schooled students from The Wider School of Elverson won third place in the B.E.S.T Robotic Competition on Nov. 24 at the Penn State DuBois Campus, Dubois.
In 2013 Lynne Burkholder and her daughter Robyn Saunders started The Wider School homeschool offering at 4043 Main St. in Elverson.
“We offer an educational environment where home schooled students receive the benefits and structure of learning within a community while also experiencing the independence and flexibility of home schooling,” she said.
The home schooled students that competed include Andrew O’Donohue, 15, 10th grade, Fleetwood (Builder & Programmer); Ben Cupo, 14, 9th grade, Elverson (Builder); Daniel Lantz, 13, 8th grade, Reading (Builder & Programmer); Sam Petersheim, 16, 10th grade, Morgantown (Marketing Team); Jesse Burkholder, 12, 6th grade, Elverson (Builder & Marketing team.); Nicky Sue, 14, 9th grade, Elverson (Engineering Notebook team); Lydia Leaman, 13, 8th grade, Mohnton (Marketing Team & Notebook Team); Reagan, 14, 7th grade Morgantown (Marketing Team); and Mallory, 12, 6th grade, Morgantown (Marketing Team).
“When you are no longer curious you have no more fuel for learning,” said Burkholder, “we seek to create independent learners for any educational environment and the professional world.
Curriculum includes STEM: science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Integrating these disciplines into learning based on real-world applications.
“Seeking 21st century skills I thought robotics would fits snuggly into our STEM vein. In my search I stumbled across B.E.S.T., which stands for “Boosting Engineering, Science, and Technology,” she said.
B.E.S.T. is a national middle and high school robotics competition seeking to engage and excite students about STEM as well as inspire them to pursue careers in these fields, according to http://www.bestinc.org.
“We found a small hub in Dubois, PA and the six-week challenge began,” said Burholder.
Two parallel competitions included are the robotics competition and the B.E.S.T Award.
For the robotics competition, each school is provided an identical kit of equipment and parts, a set of game rules, and given six weeks to design, build, and test a remote controlled robot that outperforms other robots.
Engineers, University faculty members, and other technical professionals from local industry serve as team mentors, advising and guiding students throughout the design and contest. Students’ parents with these credentials quickly joined the team.
In addition to the robotics competition, students compete for the BEST Award, the team that best embodies the concept of “Boosting Engineering, Science, and Technology”.
The 5 elements of the BEST Award are project engineering notebook; marketing presentation; team exhibit and interview; spirit and sportsmanship; robot performance.
“This has been an unbelievable experience for the students. Nothing beats a real world project where they have to determine what functional requirements are important for their robot, implement those requirements, manage their time, work within a budget, market the robot to the community, build a presentation and present it to a panel of judges,” said Lori Spahr, a homeschooling mother for the past three years with two children home schooling and two children in public school.
She added, “All these skills are developed and enhanced while negotiating a team environment. It’s like one of those Visa commercials – it’s priceless,”
The competition is comprised of four events. Kick-Off Day in September unveils the game challenge and playing field and the six-week long “design-and-build” phase begins. Mall Day in October is typically during the 5th week, for which teams practice driving their robots on the playing field set up at a local mall. Game Day in late October is when the actual competition takes place. Winners of both the Robotics and BEST Award divisions advance to a regional championship. Regional Championship is in early December. Winning teams from all hubs within a BEST geographical region compete for the regional title.
“Our team was buzzing with ideas when we got back from the kick off of the robotics competition. We had all of the supplies and knowledge we needed to start making our robot, marketing it, and documenting the engineering process, so we got to work,” posted on the student-made website http://widerbestrobot.wix.com/home.W
“Our students struck “Pay Dirt” at game day,” said Donahue, noting that the team slogan is Pay Dirt. “We came in third for the B.E.S.T award, which is the overall award. We got third place around the board, on our presentation, the booth, engineering notebook, and the robot. We are going to Fargo, North Dakota for Regionals!” beamed Donahue joined by all the happy winners.
“The challenge was building their robot to mine the ores on all different levels using elevators, fitting through doors, a robot capable of mining and delivering the commodities to their storage compartment on the playing field,” she said.
The team posted on their website, “We are a homeschooled group of kids from Pennsylvania. Our grades rage from 6th to 10th grade. We are a group of nine, four girls and five boys. Although we are a small group we are determined to build the best robot that we can.”
They added, “In addition to gearing up the robot ready for game day guided by a driver and a spotter through the mine, the marketing and engineering notebook team kicked into gear, big time. It was crunch time. The notebook team had a week earlier deadline to turn in their comprehensive documentation from start to finish of all materials, strategy, and engineering functions. They placed third in their category!
The marketing team had the very important job of selling the robot, because what’s the point of making a robot and not being able to sell it? They had to make a trade show booth to show our peers the robot and the company behind it, as well as a marketing presentation that was presented to a panel of judges,” the students posted online.
Nicole Burkholder, 9th grade homeschooler at Wider School said, “Being on the robotics team has provided me the opportunity to grow with new knowledge and through this experience I have had the privilege of growing new friendships.”
Lydia Leaman, 8th Grade homeschooler at Wider School said, “I have enjoyed almost everything about this project but most importantly it has been a good team building experience for all of us. I learned quite a bit about managing a business. Scheduling things out really is a key to success.”
Open to all schools, every year the theme of the B.E.S.T robotics competition changes. The theme can range anywhere between wind turbines to space transport. For more information visit http://www.bestinc.org.
For more information about the Wider School go to Facebook Wider School, visit http://www.thewiderschool.com/, email widerbestrobot@gmail.com, lynneburkholder@gmail.com or call 610-858-1906.
