HONOLULU - Maui High School science teacher Keith Imada expected to spend the rest of his spring break doing household chores.
Instead, he'll be planning a trip to Georgia for his students, who worked with pupils from two other schools to capture a regional robotics competition title over the weekend on Oahu.
With the title, the team advances to a world championship competition in April.
"We were thinking we were not going to go beyond this," Imada said by cellular phone from Oahu on Sunday. "No one was looking beyond this. I thought I was going to be doing housework this weekend."
Maui High Schools' "Blue Thunder" robotics team joined with teams from McKinley and Moanalua high
schools on Oahu to win the 2009 NASA/BAE Systems FIRST in Hawaii Regional Robotics Competition held at the University of Hawaii's Stan Sheriff Center in Manoa on Friday and Saturday. (FIRST stands for For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology.)
The 19-member Maui High School team is the first from Maui to qualify for the FIRST World Championship, according to a news release from the governor's office.
"I'm still in shock," said 16-year-old Jon Asato of Kahului.
The sophomore helped build the 117-pound robot, whose name Mau-E was patterned after Pixar Animation Studios' robot character WALL-E. He said this is just Maui High's second year in the competition, after the team's robot broke last year.
"But, you know what, experience from last year really gave us an edge this year," he said by cellular phone as the team spent Sunday afternoon at Pearlridge Center on Oahu.
Fellow builder Brandon Pimentel, 16, also was surprised by the team's win that generated reactions of hugging and jumping Saturday.
"We actually didn't believe it at first," said the Kahului resident.
More than 1,000 students and 34 teams from Hawaii, the Mainland, Mexico and the Philippines competed.
The competition is full of complex rules and terminology. Basically, two alliances (red and blue) that are made up of three teams each battle against each other. Each team uses a remote-controlled robot that carries a trailer. To score, robots throw "orbit balls" into the opposing team's trailer.
Robots can help block other robots from scoring on their teammates.
This year's challenge was named "Lunacy" to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11's historic lunar mission.
To simulate driving in the one-sixth gravity on the moon's surface, the students maneuvered their robots on a game field "crater" that was covered with a slick, polymer material.
To take the top honors, the Maui High alliance beat the alliance of Farrington High School and Punahou School, both on Oahu, and Prospect High School from California.
Imada said Maui High School had a losing record of five wins and six losses during the competition but was fortunate to be picked by higher-ranked teams to form the winning alliance.
Waialua High School from Oahu won the Regional Chairman's Award and is the fourth Hawaii team that will also advance to the World Championship.
Baldwin High School also competed and advanced to the quarter-final round.
The competition began earlier this year, as students were given a common engineering problem to solve using a standard kit of parts and a common set of rules, but no instructions. Working with mentors, they had six weeks to build a robot, using their minds, innovation and teamwork.
Maui High's mentors were software engineers Ross Matoi and Wes Ueoka, both Maui High alumni, and Wayne Axelson.
Imada said the students also received help from automotive teacher Neill Nakamura, as students had to weld pieces of aluminum together for the robot. The robot is around 60 inches tall and was made using aluminum brackets, sheet metal and poles. It also has wiring for its controls.
Robot programmer Melanie Ragamat called her task challenging.
"It was very hard. We didn't know how to work with the system. It's the first year they used it," she said.
The 17-year-old senior from Paia said she and other team members put in long hours.
During the final stages of building the robot, she would stay after school from 1:30 to 9 or 10 p.m. Then she would spend several more hours working on Sunday.
"At first it was really hard. Actually when I got into it, I enjoyed it. It became part of daily agenda," she said.
The experience has inspired Ragamat to consider pursuing a career in engineering. She will attend Washington State University in the fall.
Pimentel said he wanted to participate because he enjoys extracurricular activities, and the experience can lead to job opportunities and scholarships.
"Not only is it for fun and you can hang out with your friends and stuff, it teaches you life lessons," he said.
Both Pimentel and Asato said they liked the competition message of "gracious professionalism," which applied in the way losers and winners treated one another.
Imada might be looking for some graciousness too. He said he may have to turn to fundraising to get the team to Atlanta.
For more information and a list of other award winners, see: www.robotics.hawaii.gov.
* Melissa Tanji can be reached at mtanji@ mauinews.com.
