Congresswoman Foxx is the Keynote Speaker at the 1st Yadkin Bots Tournament!

The classrooms, hallways and cafeterias in all 10 of the Yadkin County North Carolina elementary and middle schools were buzzing the next school day back after the 1^st Yadkin Bots Tournament  about how Congresswoman Foxx had lunch with the Yadkin Bots teams and listened as they told her about what they were learning from the robotics competition.

Congresswoman Foxx (@VirginiaFoxx) put an exclamation point on the important skills the students were acquiring as a result of the FIRST Lego League robotics competition.  She watched as Sam McCormick (@mustinnov8), a partner in Must-Innov8, Inc., introduced the teams along with their coaches and mentors.  The judges, referees and volunteers lined up and high-fived the teams as they ran into the gymnasium at Forbush Middle School in the heart of Yadkin County, NC.

Parents, siblings and friends cheered for the teams as they filled the gym floor.  They stood expectantly as superintendent Dr. Todd Martin welcomed everyone to the first ever Yadkin Bots Tournament.  After expressing his appreciation to the sponsors, Dr. Martin introduced Representative Foxx.

Representative Foxx talked about how much she enjoyed the opportunity to meet with the students during the lunch break.  She talked about how exciting it is for a former teacher and community college president to see students having this much fun on robotics teams.  She told them they were learning skills that will be critically important when they enter the workforce.  Representative Foxx talked about how desperately the United States needs graduates with a passion for Science, Technology, Engineering and Math.  She told the students and parents that there are 4 million high paying jobs that are unfilled because companies cannot find qualified candidates, while 12 million people are looking for work.  The skills those companies need are the very skills and knowledge that the students are gaining in this program.

Kevin Austin, President of Austin Enclosures and Chairman of Yadkin County Commissioners, talked about the challenging morning the students had.  He explained how the elementary and middle school students had to make presentations to 3 sets of judges.  Kevin was a judge for the Robot Design Strategy and he talked about how impressed he was with the presentations and how most of the members of the teams contributed to the presentation.  He then looked back and forth along the line of students and yelled “Are you ready to rumble?”

The gym echoed with the screams of “Yes!” from the teams.  The teams ran to get their robots.  Two teams at a time, the 10 teams began their race against the clock.  Each team was trying to get their robot to complete some of  the 15 challenges and return safely to homebase, all without any human assistance.  What was amazing was that none of these students had prior experience developing a game strategy, designing and building a robot or programming.

As we proceeded through the competition, I kept thinking about Dean Kamen, founder of FIRST Robotics, quote about wanting to sneak up on kids and get them to love science and math.  As I watched the event, I realized how successful Kamen was in achieving his mission.

Simultaneously starting 10 FIRST Lego League teams across a school system would have been impossible without having a unique collaboration of school system administrators, business leaders, civic leaders and a wonderful collection of teacher/coaches and mentors from industry.  The Steering Committee was composed of folks who reached out and encouraged their friends and neighbors to volunteer.  The adults had as much fun as the kids.

The partners of Must-Innov8, Inc. provided a template for implementation and actively mentored the Steering Committee.  As Dr. Martin said to the committee during the last meeting before the tournament, “I want this to be big…really big.”  Tom Dorsett, president of a large Yadkin County engineering company, added, “I want it to be so big that we struggle to fund it.”

After a week to catch our breath, the Steering Committee and the teacher/coaches will begin a visioning process designed to expand these types of afterschool programs from Kindergarten through 12^th grade.  “It will take a lot of different shiny hooks in the water if we are to come anywhere close to meeting the demand for STEM trained students,” explained Joe Kronner (@JoeKronner) of Must-Innov8, Inc.  “There are a whole range of exciting programs like rocketry and robotic submersibles to choose from,” McCormick added.  “Making all of this happen requires engaging more people from the community as volunteers.  After Saturday’s tournament we had people asking how they could get involved,” Kronner concluded.

Dr. Mack McCary, an innovation evangelist at Must-Innov8, Inc. and a former school superintendent, summed it up saying, “Sam and Joe developed a “stealth” approach for exciting students about STEM subjects.  The students are having so much fun they hardly realize the future-ready STEM skills and knowledge they are acquiring.  The afterschool STEM teams can help ignite and sustain student passion for acquiring STEM knowledge through middle school, which is where typically half of the students lose their interest in STEM subjects.  Having business leaders at the table ensures that the programs will focus the students on acquiring the skills that will make them valuable in the job marketplace.  We need rapid change in order to fill the critical shortage of innovative STEM trained workers.  These STEM teams can rapidly change student attitudes about the importance of learning about STEM.  With help from industry we can then expose students to an exciting array of career options that helps inspire their motivation to learn.”