A group of Marcellus Driver Middle School students are arriving in Houston Wednesday after earning a spot in this week’s highly competitivefour-day robotics world championship. But first came some devastating news.
The team, which calls itself Crocs in Socks, have proudly worn the clog-style shoes over a pair of socks at each of their qualifying wins, and had plans to wear them at the final competition in Texas. But official rules barred open-toed shoes the championshipfor the FIRST Lego League.
The program pushes kids to use coding, engineering team work and robotics to address real-word problems in a competitive setting. FIRST stands for "For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology," and is a nonprofit focused on driving STEM education, which teamed up with the owner of the Lego Group to create the league.
Crocs in Socks over the last eight months has worked to become one of the top 108 competitors out of more than 20,000 FIRST Lego League teams across the world, but the league's rules against their signature footwear means they'll be forced to present without it.
But the seven-person team tapped into the problem-solving skills that the league strikes to develop in order to come up with a back up plan. Fifth-grader Aria Murphy said she was confident they could find a solution.
“I was disappointed on that rule, but I think we can make it work,” Aria said.
Sophie Smorol, also in fifth-grade, said they were looking at ways to still show off their signature style.
“Another idea we had was wearing our Crocs on some other part of our body,” she said.
Others suggested hanging Crocs off a belt; taping the clog-style shoe to a hat or headband, or even donning crocodile slippers. This was quickly discarded as house shoes surely wouldn’t be allowed. They explain Crocs, the clothing brand— not the shoes with the holes in them—also make loafers, which they might wear as these look like typical shoes, but are still technically "crocs."
Rules, they agree, are flexible, but their banter on the topic also shows their versatile brainstorming skills, demonstrating there’s always more than one way to solve a problem.
Crocs in Socks coach Nora Coombs said that's critical to the FIRST Lego League Championship.
It’s #FIRSTChamp week and we’re excited to celebrate all the teams’ accomplishments from the #SUPERPOWERED season. And we can’t wait to share the sneak peek at the 2023-2024 @firstlegoleague season and FIRST LEGO League Challenge later this week! pic.twitter.com/qy6YVgXUjj
— LEGO Education (@LEGO_Education) April 17, 2023
“One of the things I really like about FIRST is that it teaches these kids that they can solve hard problems,” she said. “It's doable. We built a prototype, and they can see it. We've talked about all the rules that go into making the sort of product. And these are conversations we wouldn't have had otherwise.”
Nora coaches the team along with her husband Kevin Coombs. The engineers are parents to Crocs in Socks team member Ryan Coombs. They have led FLL teams for five years, starting with their oldest, daughter Allison, 16, then with son, Connor, 13, and now Ryan, 9.
Making STEM a sport
Founder of FIRST, Dean Kamen, created the program to motivate the next generation of engineers. Kamen, known for inventing innovative medical devices, the robotic wheelchair iBOT and even the Segway, wanted to create a program that would be as exciting as varsity sports.
Nora said that's come true, likening the FIRST championship to professional soccer's World Cup.
“In the competition, they have announcers. They have referees,” she explained. “There's points. People crowd around. They clap, and they cheer. There's crazy outfits.”
Team member Sophie said that's the part of FIRST Lego League that she looks forward to.
“My favorite thing about the club is going to competitions and getting to meet other teams and just compete and invent,” she said.
The FIRST competitions measure how well teams work together to develop a invention that aims to address a real-world issue, and separately, to create and program robots with Legos that can navigate tasks around a designated playing field.
While team members mention brain breaks — time the coaches allow to jump on the trampoline or kick around a soccer ball — and the camaraderie as among their favorite components of FLL, it's the robot runs that receive the most hype and is a favorite of all Crocs in Socks team members, including sixth-grader Matthew Shooshan.
“I like everything about the Lego League,” Matthew said, “but, what I probably like the most, is going to the competitions and the robot runs.”
A robot run, the team explains, is a mission where programed robots complete as many tasks — picking up and placing cones or cubes — within an allotted time frame. Each completed task is worth a set number of points. A perfect run can score 420 points.
Team member Aria said the team's highest score have been 270.
“But we’re thinking about adding more missions, which can get us more points. And, this is just the luck of it, you have a team across from you on another board doing the same thing. There's a mission called the High Five. If both of you complete the High Five, then it's an extra 10 points. We do that mission, so we could earn 300 points, if we're lucky,” she said, excitedly.
Prep work includes writing the code to program the robot but also careful choreography to ensure team placement will lead to an optimized performance, said coach Nora Coombs.
“The robot includes designing attachments, building attachments and programming the robot,” she said. “Then there's kind of an athletic component. It's two and a half minutes, and we like to have every kid get to the table. So, we practice who does what when … We spend a good amount of time just practicing those handoffs.”
During a team meeting ahead of the trip to Houston, the students gathered around the robot table as Coach Kevin Coombs guided them on a new technique called a gyro, where a sensor is used that measures the robot's rotational motion and changes its orientation.
Aria said like the others, she loves the robot runs too, but also likes another aspect, which challenges teams to invent something new.
“I also really like our presentation with the Amazon reviews,” she said, referring to the mock reviews for their invention that they are expected to create.
For this presentation, teams must solve a real-world problem around each year’s competition theme. This year’s question: “How can we reduce energy consumption in our community.”
Students start by researching — not only in books or online but by talking with experts.
Crocs in Socks started in August by visiting the NYSERDA — New York State Energy Research and Development Authority — booth at the New York State Fair, coach Kevin Coombs said, to learn about what challenges exist in our region around energy efficiency.
“We want to do things that can have an impact in our own houses,” he said. “What they came up with in Syracuse is that it's hot in the day and cool in the nighttime. So, a lot of people run their air conditioner at night to cool their house when they could just open the window. So, they invented a smart window called the Breezer 5000.”
The invention from Crocs in Socks helps reduce energy costs by circulating fresh air throughout your house when the environmental conditions are appropriate.
They prepared their presentation for the competition by doing a test run with McClurg Remodeling & Construction Services.
The team describes the Breezer 5000’s features by reading what they predict consumers might say in an Amazon review. This provides details to the judges on their research and development of their device. For example, based on weather data from 2021, they found the Breezer 5000 could reduce air conditioner usage by two hours per day, adding up to 108 days, saving approximately $194 per year.
Launching the region's next STEM leaders
The Coombs coaches learned about FIRST Lego League when the couple worked in Wisconsin at GE Healthcare and saw how excited colleagues were to volunteer for the program. When they moved back to Syracuse, they couldn’t find an offering and decided to take it up themselves.
Kevin Cooombs works as an engineer at Waygate Technologies in Skaneateles, which makes video inspection equipment for jet engines, wind turbines and power plants. Nora Coombs works as an engineer at Rheonix, a small medical device company based in Ithaca. Both, too, have served as hiring managers and note that having "Lego Alum" on a resume always stands out.
“We sort of see that kids who come to us to work for us, who have been in FLL, are just so far advanced compared to the others in their interview cohort,” Kevin said. “I think we spend so much time driving our kids to sports and doing all of the music things and the other extracurriculars that we felt it was our duty to expose them to STEM, especially since it's right in our wheelhouse.”
Back in Syracuse, having experience with FLL can prove immediately valuable, as these are skills the STEAM school is looking to see in student applicants. Set to open in fall of 2025, the STEAM School — standing for Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Mathematics — will be the first collaborative high school in Central New York.
Jeremy Belfield, a STEAM school collaborator and superintendent at LaFayette Central School District, said students, especially those with a passion for science, may apply if they reside in the city of Syracuse or any Onondaga, Cortland or Madison county BOCES component district.
“The application process is an opportunity for kids to write to us and talk to us about what their interest level is in these great programs and provide some samples of work that they've done,” he explained during a virtual presentation last month. “Maybe they did a Lego robotics league in middle school. Maybe they participated in studio art in middle school. This is the opportunity to upload some of those great projects that they might have worked on that showcase some of their interest level in these areas.”
Unaware of the planned STEAM school, both coaches believe cultivating an interest in science and technology early is vital. Nora Coombs has even met with the Central New York Community Foundation about launching FLL in city schools.
“I believe that if there was a club or a way for kids to try out engineering or other STEM activities, there would probably be more interest,” she said. “There's a lot of information out there about how girls, especially if you don't get them interested in the middle school ages, they will completely discount [STEM] by the time they're in high school; they won't even give it a chance. So, I think there's definitely an opportunity here, and it would be fantastic if all this hard work could make a bigger impact in Syracuse.”
Nora said the CNYCF shared it is already looking into how to expand these pathways.
In a statement, CNYCF said it “recognizes the importance of educating local youth on the topics of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math, especially as the need for these skillsets increases with a growing local technology sector. We are currently collaborating with area funders to identify future programming opportunities.”
A spokesperson said as more becomes formalized, further details will be shared.
Long road to world competition
Now, Crocs in Socks is preparing to take all they’ve learned this year to Houston for the final competition held through Saturday this week.
Just to get there they had to succeed at a qualifying competition late last year, a regional in February and launched aGoFundMe campaign to help cover the estimated $29,000 price tag for the trip to Texas.
At the end of March, they’d raised over $8,000, which even team member Ryan knows is a lot.
“Here’s how much it actually is,” he explained. “It’s 16 PS5s.”
By this week, the community’s support helped raise more than $12,000, or about 24 Sony PlayStation 5s.
Tune in to watch the competition live online to see how Crocs in Socks does and what new footwear they decide to wear.
Editor's note: The Central New York Community Foundation is a financial supporter of WAER.
