INDIANAPOLIS — Maxwell Intermediate School’s Unified Robotics Team earned a first place finish and two other awards at its first-ever robotics competition on Saturday, Dec. 9.
The contest, which took place at Indianapolis Public School 61, was for students in grades 4-6 with special needs.
Maxwell’s team not only won first place in the overall competition but also won awards for “Best Teamwork” and “Team Spirit.”
Lynnea Case, Greenfield-Central’s assistant director of special education, said it was a thrill to watch the students excel competing against their peers.
“They not only won first place but won it by quite a bit, so they were incredibly proud of themselves,” she said.
The students were tasked with programming a robot to complete a number of tasks on a playing field, where the robot manipulated Legos on a board.
As with all Unified team sports, students with special needs are paired with “typical peers” who lend support and help out when needed.
“Our typical peers were awesome and worked really well with our unified champions,” said Dawn Joslin, a fourth grade special resources teacher at Maxwell.
The robotics coach was impressed with how quickly her team caught on to coding.
“Our STEM teacher and I used to run a computer science club and we’ve both done lots of coding, and this is one of the most difficult programs we’ve ever helped students with,” she said.
The Unified Robotics program introduces STEM concepts to people with intellectual disabilities in a way that will open doors for them in their future.
According to UnifiedRobotics.org, the program “is game-changer for students with special needs…People with intellectual disabilities, from whom the least is expected, can meaningfully participate with best and the brightest scientists among their peers. They can learn real technical skills, they can build a robot, they can go to college and be gainfully employed.”
Despite the bigger picture, Maxwell students were simply focused on the thrill of competition at Saturday’s contest, where they competed against two teams from Avon.
Joslin said her six-member team is the first Unified Robotics team in Hancock County that’s registered with Special Olympics.
“I hope to see many more to come. It’s amazing,” said Joslin, who was thrilled to see her team excel with minimal preparation.
“We didn’t receive our kit until November, so we were only able to meet five times before the competition,” she said.
She and fellow teachers are already writing grants to get more robotics kits for future competitions.
“We’re hoping that it continues to grow and have offered to host next year for our area, so hopefully we’ll have some sort of competition here locally next year,” she said.
