Fishers RoboForce Robotics Team Qualifies for World Championship
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The RoboForce robotics Team, which consists of several Fishers residents, recently qualified for a world championship competition that will take place this spring.
Pankaj Negi, the team’s head coach, said he couldn’t be prouder. The goal of the team is to learn robotics, improve core values, and find solutions to challenging problems.
“RoboForce is an independent team run by family and friends,” Negi says. “We have an assistant coach, Priyamvada Rajsheel, who is also a Fishers resident. The team consists of the following Hamilton Southeastern Intermediate-Junior High students – my son Hardik Negi, and Manav Krishna, Lakshay Mahajan and Manas Yadav. Another student, Swayam Patankar, who was an earlier Fishers resident, recently moved to Carmel.”
Negi works for Fishers-based consulting company Schanpore LLC.
“I consult in Microsoft technology,” he says. “Priyamvada works as quality analyst at Fiserv, a data recovery business in Fishers.”
Negi notes that the team has improved through the last couple of years.
“This is our team’s third year participating in the FLL (FIRST Lego League),” he says. “In FLL, you first compete at a regional level. From there, the top two to three teams go to the state level. And from the state, only one team goes to the World Festival. Indiana is a big state with lots of FLL teams, so it has two state-level competitions – the north competition in Fort Wayne and the south competition in Evansville.”
In its first year, the RoboForce robotics team qualified for state-level competition in Fort Wayne.
“Last year we went to southern Indiana, and then qualified for the World Festival,” Negi says. “This year is the same. The World Festival is a four-day event in Detroit, Michigan. We will be going to the World Festival at the TCF Center, formally known as Cobo Center in Detroit. The championship will be from April 29 to May 2, 2020.”
Negi says robotics is a rapidly growing field.
“(Robotics) will help the kids learn skills they can use later in jobs,” Negi says.
The kids on the team are learning a wide variety of skills.
“They are learning programming, robot construction, mechanics, web site creation and maintenance, teamwork, communication, strategy, public speaking, planning, project management, and last but not least, community service,” Negi says.
The team also comes together to innovate and solve problems. In the FLL, they are part of a thriving community full of inspiration, creativity and hope for a stronger, more sustainable future.
The team members also tour schools and libraries to educate children, and create awareness about isolation and how it affects astronauts.
Negi has thoroughly enjoyed coaching the team.
“This has truly been an amazing experience to coach these kids, and watch them find so many different innovative solutions to the problems,” Negi says. “The kids are very passionate about the team and competition.”
For more info on RoboForce, visit roboforce.net.
