Iowa students show off award-winning robot

Saketh Undurty describes the competition robot, Orion, the team built for the FIRST Tech Challenge. Team members, from left, Jordan Burklund, Sidd Somayajula and Chase Schweitzer are at the controls.

DES MOINES - A competition-winning robotics team from Valley High School in West Des Moines joined Lt. Gov. Kim Reynolds Monday to help promote STEM initiatives.

STEM is an acronym for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics that's gained buzz in education circles throughout the states.

Iowa launched a STEM initiative last year with more than $4.7 million in state dollars to create regional STEM hubs and underwrite programs for students interested in STEM courses.

The Valley High group is one of two Iowa teams that were part of a 16-country, 128-team world championship competition held last month in St. Louis. They came home with the Inspire award, which is given to a team that “truly embodied the challenge” of the competition.

Their competition robot, Orion, is designed to pick up and move objects. It is, essentially, a robotic arm on a rotating, maneuverable platform.

“This is our future folks,” said Reynolds, who co-chairs the statewide STEM initiative, as team members explained their project.

The seven-member Valley team, Beta, is made up of five boys and two girls and all are juniors at the school.

“I don't think we should feminize it,” said team member Annie Howard, when asked by a reporter for suggestions on how to get more women interested in the typically male-dominated hard science fields. “I think we should play hard-to-get.”