>>Let's get it.
>>Narrator: The members of the
Poudre High School Robotics Club are
spending every spare moment after
school and on the weekends working
on a project that would
make NASA proud.
>>Steve: Well, we got
the control board, right?
>>Yeah, right here.
>>Steve: All right.
>>Narrator: Their mission, to design
and build a highly
functioning robot in six weeks.
Their goal, to be one of the
elite teams in a field of 500
at the first robotics competition, a
frenzied test of technical wizardry,
teamwork, and strategy that plays
out each year in Orlando, Florida.
>>Announcer: Here we go, the
national championship on the line.
Our first elimination
match from the Archimedes.
Oh, ran over there's
254, the [inaudible].
>>This is going to
simulate it real well.
>>Narrator: Thanks to
robotics club's partnership
with nearby Colorado State
University, members gain access
to this state of the
art robotics lab.
>>Okay, the robot and
the rocket are to scale,
but the robot should actually
be shorter for him to--
>>Narrator: Here they test
models and plan strategies
that they hope will carry the
day at the annual robotics event.
>>We'd have 40 points for
the robots because each robot
in the end zone is 10 points.
>>What if there's a robot
that balances better than us?
>>Then they should do the balancing,
because as a group we
get all the same score
and if they can do it
better than we can,
we should go ahead
and let htem do it.
>>Narrator: To score points,
a team must work cooperatively
with four other team robots
in a race against time.
Utilizing the unique attributes
of the different robots,
one robot must come to rest balanced
on a ramp while others scurry
about moving large
balls from one side
of the playing field to the other.
>>Does it have the gyro chip in it?
>>Yes.
>>It does know that it's
balanced by the gyro chip?
>>Yeah.
>>Nice. Okay, that's good technology.
>>Narrator: The students also
get an opportunity to work
with real-world engineers and grad
student mentors at the university.
>>Steve: Engineers are an
essential part of the program.
>>Nice.
>>Steve: The kids should
be and are right next
to those engineers while
they're making those decisions.
Instead of asking what do we do next,
they're asking why did you do that?
>>Janet: To make it move you
have to push down on all kinds
of different combinations.
Are you guys going to change that?
>>You can get a programmable
controller
where you could program
code and see--
>>Steve: And with that, then
they're getting that explanation
from a real-world engineer,
somebody who's been there,
somebody who knows how
the whole system works.
>>This is hard.
It's hard for her, is
it hard for a robot?
>>Janet: It's the students themselves
who are designing the robot,
and it's the students themselves
who are fabricating the robot.
And then it's the students who
actually get to see it come to life.
Well it shows what
you can do yourself
and how you can apply the
knowledge you've learned,
but then it also shows how
much you still have to learn.
>>Write the dates up for this Sunday.
>>Narrator: Beyond engineering,
team members learn how
to organize fundraisers and make
presentations to local businesses
so they can raise the tens of
thousands of dollars they need
to travel to the various
events each year.
>>Steve: Yebing is going
to put together a website
for us that's going to be--
>>Steve: There's people that do
travel, there's artists that we need,
there's marketing,
there's documentation.
You bring in this eclectic
group of kids
and they get to work with each other.
And that's something that a lot
of extracurriculars do not
give you the opportunity to do.
>>Steve: [Inaudible]
>>Announcer: [Inaudible]
>>Narrator: The Poudre High team
finally saw their hard work pay off
at the regional competition
in San Jose, California.
Their robot performed
admirably and was able
to lend a helping hand
to a robot in distress.
>>Tyson: I've learned
an incredible amount.
Just through working with
mentors and my peers and going
through the engineering process has
really given me kind of an experience
of what engineering is actually like.
>>Steve: It's the culmination of six
to eight weeks of intense hard work
and finally it's you in the
spotlight being celebrated
for what you've done.
You have a passion and once you
have passion, what can stop you?
>>Woo!
>>Good job!
>>Narrator: For more
information on what works
in public education,
go to edutopoia.org.
