Birmingham middle schools expand robotics programming

BIRMINGHAM — Birmingham Public Schools plans to expand their middle school robotics program and add an all-girls team next year.

They are seeking more involvement from adults in the community to support and supervise the program.

Birmingham Public Schools’ robotics programs are part of the FIRST Robotics organization. FIRST stands for ​​For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology.

At the middle school level, students participate in the FIRST Tech Challenge, which gives students experience in hands-on engineering and also teaches kids soft skills, such as community outreach.

“It is a really cool program that builds on a lot of real-world life skills for students that they don’t get in other programs through their experiences at schools,” Berkshire Middle School science teacher Phillip Goeman said.

The main competition season starts the first week of September, when teams learn what the challenge is for that year. The main season runs until December, but it could potentially go beyond that, depending on if teams qualify to compete on the state and world level in the spring.

Goeman started the robotics program on the middle school level at Birmingham seven years ago, when he started teaching at Berkshire Middle School. It started with eight kids and has since evolved into a larger program, with over 40 kids. This year, Berkshire Middle School had three coed teams for students in sixth, seventh and eighth grade, and Derby Middle School had one. The Derby Middle School team was open to both boys and girls, but they did not have any girls participating this year.

“I think robotics is for everybody. It’s one of those things where even if you think you are not a techy person or you don’t like tools or you don’t like programming, there is so much more to the program than just the technical skills kids learn,” Goeman said.

Birmingham parent and retired engineer Erin Phillips started the robotics program at Derby Middle School this fall when her son started eighth grade. She plans to coach the all-girls team this year as her daughter starts at Derby Middle School.

“Being a female in engineering, I know, can have its challenges, and I definitely want to open as many doors for girls as I can,” Phillips said.

The all-girls team will include students from Berkshire and Derby middle schools.

The idea for the all-girls team actually grew from feedback from students and parents. While many girls found success on the coed teams, some girls wanted an opportunity to have their own space where their voices could be more easily heard.

“We truly invite every kid to be a part of this program,” Goeman said. “Part of our expansion is just trying to make the team and program more accessible to as many students as possible.”

Goeman said any limit on the expansion is not caused by lack of student interest, but a lack of adult and community support.

“We actually have enough kids interested to start more teams; however, we lack the adult involvement and supervision that’s necessary to make these teams successful,” Goeman said.

Goeman hopes that parents and members of the community will reach out to help with the robotics program so that the program can continue to expand.