Lynn students place high in space race

LYNN – The force was with a group of middle school students who competed in a race in space last week as part of the Summer of Innovation program launched by NASA.The Lynn YMCA team came in third in the Zero Robotics Competition that began with middle school teams around the state programming small computers modeled after the floating ball Luke Skywalker uses for light saber training in the movie “Star Wars.” Timilty Middle School of Roxbury came in second and the team from the Malden YMCA took top droid honors.”We were really, really proud of them,” said Audrey Jimenez, the Lynn Y’s branch director. “It was neat because they got a different look at what you can do with math and science. It really opened up some windows for them.”Two Lynn teams, one based at YMCA and the other at Ford Elementary School, spent five weeks learning to program SPHERES – Synchronized Position Hold, Engage, Reorient, Experimental Satellites – robots roughly the size and shape of the average bowling ball.Ford teachers and staff were particularly impressed by their team since, with the exception of one eighth-grader, the students were in the fourth and fifth grades competing against older middle school kids.”They really did us proud,” said Claire Crane, principal of the Ford School. “They did do well, they did. They made the city of Lynn very proud.”Jimenez said the YMCA team was not thrilled at first to give up a summer’s worth of fun and field trips to the beach to work on computer programming.”But once they got going and started seeing what they could do, they started to buy into the program,” said Jimenez, who added that the program was targeted toward kids who needed a little inspiration with science, technology, engineering and math studies.And they got plenty of it from Iris Rivas, the Y’s education manager, Gaston de Zarraga, a volunteer mentor from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and volunteer Kay Redd. The students learned to write computer code that allowed their robot to compete in obstacle course races with other SPHERE robots programmed by middle school teams.SPHERES were designed in 1999 by a class of MIT students who accepted a challenge from their professor to recreate the “Star Wars” prop. The MIT students received some high-powered help from NASA, but the space agency also benefited from the project. Astronauts are now using SPHERES to dock and maneuver around the International Space Station.And the space station was the starting line for the SPHERES programmed by the middle school teams. Astronaut Shannon Walker took a break from regular space station duties to officiate the races. The students had the chance to watch and cheer on their robots thanks to a live feed from the space station to MIT.”It was really great exposure to math and science,” said Jimenez, who said the kids now have a much better idea of the type of jobs a solid education in math can lead to.The Zero Robotics competition was part of a federal government push to boost student interest and ability in science, technology, engineering and math. The program was funded by the American Recovery and Investment Act.The two Lynn teams received grants to participate in the program from the Massachusetts Afterschool Partnership. Katie Magrane, associate director of the Partnership and a Lynn native, said the big push now is to boost student leaning in science, technology, engineering and math and the Zero Robotics competition not only did that, but it did it in a very fun, very cool way that captured the imaginations of the students on both Lynn teams.”NASA and the entire MIT SPHERES Team made this a truly memorable experience for each and every one of the students,” Magrane said.