The CocoNuts Robotics "News Feed"

After the controlled chaos of FIRST in Atlanta, the CocoNuts have settled into calmer, but just as important, pursuits: namely teaching the Northern Arizona University Summer Enrichment Program (NAU SEP) “Spirit and Opportunity” section for the second year in a row. The CocoNuts teach their “made-from-scratch” Mars rover based curriculum using LEGO Mindstorms Robot Kits (a.k.a. – FLL bots).

So, if you want to see the CocoNuts putting STEM into action, stop by the NAU College of Education, Rm 174, between 6-8 PM, June 2-8 or June 12-18.

GO NUTS!

On January 8th-9th, the CocoNuts will be heading down to the Brophy PreparatoryAcademy in Phoenix to learn this year’s game for the 2010 FIRST Robotics Competition and to participate in all the accompanying workshops.

On December 5th, the CocoNuts hosted the first-ever “High Altitude Robotics Extravaganza”  which consisted of both the Northern Arizona Regional FLL Tournament  and the Arizona FTC Championship at Coconino High School in Flagstaff, AZ. In the Northern AZ FLL Tournament 29 total teams competed, 26 of them mentored by the CocoNuts. 6 teams qualified for the Arizona State FLL competition:  the Straight Lines, Legoporation, West Sedona Lego Leaders, Skittles, Communicators, and the M3MS-O’-M3LONZ. These teams will compete at the Arizona State FLL Competition at Arizona State University in Tempe, AZ on December 11th. On the other side of the High Altitude Robotics Competion, in the Arizona FTC Championship Tournament, ten teams from across Arizona competed and two went to state: The Dukes and the RoboBuffs. The CocoNuts Robotics team organized, kept score, helped judges, reset the fields and did almost everything else to make sure that the High Altitude Robotics Extravaganza was a success. In the end each of the CocoNuts and each of the participants had a good time at this successful event.

With only one month until the “High Altitude Robotics Extravaganza” of the NorAZ FLL Regional and the AZ State FTC Regional, the CocoNuts have:

• All NINE FLL fields built (minus tables)
  - Four for official matches
  - Three for judging
  - Two for practice
• ONE FTC Field built
  (we’re sharing with the Los Angeles and San Diego FTC regional competitions  so we should have three total at the tourney)
• TWENTY-SIX FLL teams from Flagstaff alone attending our regional, mentored by the CocoNuts, with more from around Arizona for TWENTY-NINE total attending
• ONE new FTC team in Flagstaff at our sister school Sinagua High (Yay!)

Not including the around thirty CocoNuts doing this all: GO NUTS!

This past Sunday, October 4th, the CocoNuts gathered at Coconino High School to get to know one another better whilst having fun. From CocoNuts trivia, to ultimate Frisbee, the CocoNuts bonded and became more of a team.

The Northern Arizona Regional FLL Tournament is now filled to the brim with Flagstaff area FLL teams. Out of 32 available spots at the tournament, there should be at least 31 teams by the end of registration, with 29 teams coming from Flagstaff alone. Considering that the Flagstaff Unified School District has pulled funding for the FUSD STEM Initiative, and each public school is paying for their team(s) by themselves,  so seeing this much growth (or retention thereof) from 16 teams in 2008 is truly a testament to the efforts of the CocoNuts.

This year the CocoNuts have spent considerable effort on creating teams outside of FUSD: this year there have been numerous community teams, home-schooled teams, and private/charter school teams established, while still maintaining a large base of FLL teams in public schools.

This year’s tournament should be a blast, with over great FLL turnout alongside the AZ State FTC Championship. It shows just how far Flagstaff has come since the establishment of FIRST in Flagstaff in 2007 with the CocoNuts.

Last Friday, after a week of preparation, the CocoNuts packed up their demonstartion gear, and their robots, Astra and RoboPup, and took them downtown for the Flagstaff Festival of Science . The next day on Saturday, the CocoNuts excited the youth of Northern Arizona about STEM (Science, Technology, engineering, Mathematics) at “Science in the Park” at Wheeler Park in downtown Flagstaff, with FLL and FTC demonstrations. Elementary and middle school students crowded around our FLL field, wanting to learn more. One child even asked if he could start programming one of the bots! A bit later in the day, the CocoNuts impressed a (supposedly) more mature audience at the Northern Arizona University Mountain Campus Science and Engineering Day at the High Country Conference Center. The CocoNuts and several fellow FRC teams rocketed their robots across the conference room carpet with their “more mature” audience having fun playing orbit-ball catch with the robots. At the end of the day, all the members of the CocoNuts had fun while inspiring others.

At the Festival of Science, our team realized just how successful our iniatives and public outreach activities are. Parents walked up to us wanting to learn how to start an FLL team, organizations and businesses came up to us asking how they could help, random people came up and told us that they could volunteer for whatever we needed. It’s great to live in such a caring and supportive community as Flagstaff!