JAY — Spruce Mountain High School students who are part of Blue Crew FRC Team 6153 on Thursday night, March 13, received permission from Regional School Unit 73 directors to attend the New England competition in Springfield, MA, April 2-5.
The team is comprised of students from Spruce Mountain and Mt. Blue high schools.
“In FIRST Robotics the biggest award you can win at a district event is called the Impact Award,” Rob Taylor, a Spruce Mountain High School science teacher and robotics mentor, said. “The Impact Award recognizes a team’s work in their school, work with their team, work with their community, work with a greater community in the state of Maine as a whole, and also working to promote the FIRST organization. It’s the best award you can get and if you win that award at one of your district qualifying events, it automatically qualifies you to go to the FIRST New England competition. Two weeks ago, down in Falmouth High School at the Southern Maine robotics competition, the Blue Crew won the Impact Award.”
Taylor noted he has been teaching about 36 years, has worked with many successful teams. “I have never had a group of kids that enjoys each other’s company as much as this group does,” he stated. “They love to spend time together. Any time there is an opportunity for them to do an event they are there. They show up, they have a great time. It’s that tightness amongst the team members that has really led to the Impact Award.”
Blue Crew members have been at all western Maine festivals doing outreach events, Taylor said. “They’ve done a ton of work here within our school and with Mt. Blue,” he noted. “They actually started a new Lego League team at Mt. Blue Middle School. This year, they raised the money to pay for the team’s registration. They helped train the mentor of the team and trained the kids on how to compete. The team won an award at the state meet.”
Blue Crew mentors FIRST LEGO League teams at Spruce Mountain Middle School, Taylor stated. “We actually hosted and ran the state competition over at Mount Blue the first Saturday in February,” he said. “The amount of work these kids have done is incredibly impressive. FIRST Robotics is a lot more than robots. We do a lot more than robots, that’s why the kids are being recognized.”
Skylar Condon, Spruce Mountain student and Blue Crew member shared numbers associated with team activities:
• Members are from over 14 towns and four counties in Maine.
• Over 2,000 hours spent during outreach events.
• More than 10,000 people reached.
• Mentored 20 teams in the last five years.
• Started two teams at Spruce Mountain Middle School, one team at Mt. Blue Middle School.
• 100% youth led team – mentors just there to support.
“We are completely student led,” Mason Labonte, Spruce student and member noted. “We split ourselves up into subgroups of business and outreach and robot building,” he stated.. “There’s a lot to running a team like ours. It’s not just building robots so it takes a lot of kids to run it.”
Leaders are chosen using written resumes and an interview process, Labonte said. An executive team meets weekly independent of mentors to maintain student leadership, he stated.
A big part of FIRST Robotics is Safety All-Stars, which is awarded to the team that has shown integrity, safety, and promoting a healthy work environment with other teams, Maggie Callaway, Spruce student and team safety captain said. “Blue Crew has won Safety All-Stars at 15 different events, and hopefully we’ll keep that streak going at our next event this weekend,” she noted. The team promotes safety not only for Blue Crew but provides tips for other teams as well, she explained.
Blue Crew won Safety All-Stars both days of the Falmouth competition, won the Impact Award and got into the playoffs, Taylor said. “Their robot was ranked 15th out of 30 after qualifying, then they have a draft,” he noted. “There are eight alliances that compete against each other in the playoffs. We were on the number five alliance. It’s a double elimination tournament. We upset the number four alliance in the first round. They lost to the number two alliance. I think it was in the second round, put them in the losers bracket. Slugged their way all the way through the losers bracket and lost to the number one alliance in the final.”
That was a pretty good weekend, Taylor said. “I am really proud of the kids,” he stressed.
Director Andrew Sylvester of Livermore asked if this would be the team’s first time competing at the New England event.
Taylor thought it would be the third time for the Blue Crew team.
Director Don Emery of Livermore Falls asked how many students from Spruce were on the team.
“There’s about 20 of us in total,” Labonte replied. “It’s pretty split, half and half between us and Mt. Blue.”
“Let’s just say New England goes outstanding,” Emery said. “You guys kick some butt, what’s after that?”
“We might be coming back to you to talk about going to Worlds in Houston, Texas, in the middle of April,” Taylor responded. “We’ll find out if we qualify for Worlds on April 6. Worlds start on April 16. You can’t make a hotel reservation until you actually qualify because you have to make your hotel reservations through FIRST. We’ll figure it out.”
We invite you to add your comments. We encourage a thoughtful exchange of ideas and information on this website. By joining the conversation, you are agreeing to our commenting policy and terms of use. More information is found on our FAQs. You can modify your screen name here.
Comments are managed by our staff during regular business hours Monday through Friday as well as limited hours on Saturday and Sunday. Comments held for moderation outside of those hours may take longer to approve.
Join the Conversation
Please sign into your Sun Journal account to participate in conversations below. If you do not have an account, you can register or subscribe. Questions? Please see our FAQs.