FIRST robotics competition draws dozens of teams to Hofstra
From left, Long Island Lutheran's Joshua Nnorom, 18, Tyler Samuel, 17, and Olivia Mirador, 18, teamed up for FIRST's robotics competition Saturday at Hofstra. Credit: Newsday/J. Conrad Williams Jr.
Under arena lights, fans waving fists and pom-poms watched as students readied their robots for competition. At the center of the floor, yellow balls in a rectangular formation sat in stillness — for the moment.
Four dozen teams of high school students from Long Island, New York City and Chinese Taipei reported to Hofstra University on Saturday for the second of a two-day robotics competition organized by the nonprofit FIRST — For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology.
In its 27th year, the cooperative tournament-style competition offers students in grades nine through 12 the opportunity to dream up and construct industrial-size robots. Alongside adult mentors, students spend about six weeks building and testing robotics that can play a game announced in January of that year.
"It's a friendly competition, or it tries to be," said Larry Toonkel, regional director of the FIRST Long Island robotics competition.
Teams, which can each consist of as many as 100 students, compete both against and alongside each other.
"If a team needs something, you're not going to hold it back," Toonkel said. "You want to win fairly."
The game typically requires robots to perform a task autonomously for the first 30 seconds; then, students drive the devices manually, Toonkel said. Robots throw balls, traverse the field and grapple up a wall, he said.
"This is like a major sporting event," Toonkel said, noting the competition involves about 150 volunteers and hundreds of thousands of dollars from sponsors and donors.
At the beginning of the season, each team received a starter kit with various components and information about acceptable sourcing for additional items. Some teams made their own parts, using some or none of the kit.
Smithtown East and West’s robots attempted to collect these yellow nuggets during the competition. Credit: Newsday/J. Conrad Williams Jr.
The Smithtown Robotics team, The Mechanical Bulls, 3D printed many of its own brightly colored parts, said Garrett Cusumano, 17, a senior at Smithtown East.
"I think it's really cool how, just how 3D printing works in general, and how you can just make whatever custom part that you need," said Cusumano, who plans to major in mechanical engineering in college. "All these custom parts, machining them out of aluminum or anything would be a nightmare."
Using a laser cutter, students in Sachem cut parts from materials like carbon fiber reinforced plastic.
"It's a lot of designing, reiteration, designing, reiteration," said John Calvin Noble, 17, a junior at Sachem North. "Our whole point this year is that we didn't want to use any of the pre-given stuff."
While some teams were playing, others were making adjustments to their robots or being interviewed by judges. Judges base their assessments on 10 technical points — how the device was built and designed — and 10 general points related to how the team organized, acquired funding and gave back to their community, Toonkel said.
"I personally actually like to go around and watch them, the inner workings in the pits," said Patrise Miller, executive director of FIRST Long Island. "To see them trying to fix something, or talk about it."
The winning alliance, a group of teams invited to the World Championship along with the FIRST Impact award winner, consisted of Southold, Kings Park and Southampton high schools.
Arielle Dollinger joined Newsday as a staff reporter in 2022. Previously, she covered local and national news as a freelancer for The New York Times, Newsday and other outlets.
