Long Island's robotics winners
Longwood Robotics (Team #564) from Longwood High School was eligible to participate in the 2019 FIRST Robotics World Championship Competition after winning the Regional Chairman's Award in the Long Island contest. Credit: Longwood Central School District
Nine local teams advanced to the 2019 FIRST Robotics World Championship Competition after taking top awards in a regional competition that challenged them to build robots.
The Long Island regional competition, with the theme "Destination: Deep Space," asked teams to score points by using robots to gather as many cargo pods as possible and prepare a fictional spaceship for liftoff before a sandstorm arrived. The multiday tourney attracted 77 teams, each of which received a kit of parts and were given six weeks to design and build a robot weighing up to 120 pounds.
The Regional Chairman's Award, which was the event's highest honor, went to POBots (Team #353) of Plainview-Old Bethpage John F. Kennedy High School and Longwood Robotics (Team #564) of Longwood High School in Middle Island. Both teams were eligible to compete last month in one of this year's world championship events in Detroit or Houston.
"Our students have worked hard all year," Plainview-Old Bethpage JFK coach Phillip Caputo said. "The dedication and drive these students have shown is truly inspiring."
Other local teams that qualified for the world championships were Aftershock (Team #263), representing both Sachem High School East and High School North, TEAM R.I.C.E. (Team #870) of Southold Junior/Senior High School, Hicksville J-Birds (Team #1468) of Hicksville High School, Rebel Robotics (Team #2638) of Great Neck South High School, ThunderColts (Team #3624), representing both Half Hollow Hills High Schools East and High School West, Mineola Wild Reds (Team #6806) of Mineola High School, and ThunderMiners (Team #7400) of Melvillecq. No Long Island teams were among the national winners.
The local competition was hosted by the School-Business Partnerships of Long Island and held at Hofstra University in late March. FIRST stands for "For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology."
DIX HILLS
Students at East Islip High School, along with teachers and family members, dressed in retro attire and were models in the school's SADD/PTSA Fashion Show, which raised more than $2,500 for the SADD program. SADD stands for Students Against Destructive Decisions. Credit: East Islip School District
LI Math Fair
The Half Hollow Hills school district in Dix Hills won seven gold medals, the most of any Suffolk County system, in the 2019 Long Island Math Fair at Hofstra University. The fair, which is open to grades seven through 12, required participants to submit essays on any math topic and give 15-minute presentations to a panel of judges.
Suffolk County's other winning districts and their gold medals totals were: Copiague, three, East Moriches and Northport-East Northport, each winning two; and Hauppauge and Huntington, each winning one.
The event was sponsored by the university in conjunction with the Nassau County Association of Mathematics Supervisors and the Nassau and Suffolk county math teachers associations.
Students in Elwood Middle School's Community Service Club shared the school's recycling routine last month with Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone and Frances Reid, the Town of North Hempstead's chief sustainability officer. The district was nominated last year to pilot the Suffolk Share recycling program. Credit: Elwood School District
HUNTINGTON STATION
Science advocate
Frederick Feraco, a science research teacher at Walt Whitman High School, has been named one of 60 advocates nationwide by the Society for Science & the Public. He is the only advocate from Long Island.
Feraco will mentor underrepresented and low-income students in an effort to guide them into entering science research competitions and succeed in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math, known as STEM. Each advocate receives a $3,000 stipend and an all-expenses-paid trip to attend the Advocate Training Institute in Washington, D.C.
ISLANDWIDE
Colby Neidig and Nicholas Brown, junior cadets in William Floyd High School's Naval Junior ROTC Program, were among 80 students nationwide participating in the Valley Forge Freedom Foundation Youth Conference, a recent four-day event in Pennsylvania that included lectures, historical tours and experiential workshops designed to help students develop leadership skills and deepen their understanding of the rights and responsibilities of citizens. Credit: William Floyd School District
Schools to Watch
Four Long Island schools — Mineola Middle School, North Shore Middle School, Plainedge Middle School and Rocky Point Middle School — are among 11 statewide identified as "2019 Essential Elements: Schools to Watch" by the state Education Department and the New York State Middle School Association.
The program recognizes schools that demonstrate continuous improvement and excel in four areas: academic excellence, developmental responsiveness, social equity and organizational structure.
Schools hold the designation for three years, then must reapply and be reevaluated.
Michael R. Ebert is an education researcher and has worked for Newsday in various capacities since 2003. He was part of an 11-person team named as 2008 Pulitzer Prize finalists for investigative coverage of the LIRR's platform safety issues.
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