San Diego Autonomous Underwater Vehicle International Student Competition
After Action Report
(SDAUVISCAAR.DOC)
Thursday, 14 August 2008
Engineering graduates of the Norwich University David Crawford School of Engineering (DCSE) competed against students from 24 other engineering programs from all over the world in San Diego California as part of the US Navy program to develop engineers educated to produce the intelligent machines needed to solve the problems of future generations.
One of the problems of future generations is the NASA objective to find life on another body in this solar system. This is most likely to happen on the Jovian moon Europa. Europa has a liquid water ocean beneath the 3 to 5 kilometer thick ice sheet at its surface. NASA is planning on landing a robot on the surface which will melt its way down through the ice and send pictures and data on what it finds back to earth. In order to do this, the robot on Europa will need to navigate based on its vision system. This is a key factor in the Navy competition and one strong reason why Vermont Space Grant provided most of the funding for this project.
This US Navy program competition is the culmination of an integrated educational ‘Sea Perch” robot submarine competition program of development that takes students as early as middle school having them design and test remotely controlled underwater vehicles that they design and test. They demonstrate their robots navigating an underwater obstacle course. In developing the robots they are required to learn the engineering skills of keeping a notebook which is the basis for a presentation that the contestants are required to make to a judging panel. The students learn from the start the importance of analysis and presentation of their results. Our students in participating in the San Diego competition were required to develop a web page and publish an article about their design. The preparation for this July 2008 competition begin in the spring of 2007. Students studied the publications of competition teams from previous years to learn all the important concepts for competing in this year’s competition. They formulated their design based on past competition experience and then made the appropriate modifications when the final rules were published in the spring of 2008.
They not only came together as a group of individuals but were required to develop an identity for their team by picking the team name (NU Bot-Rodders) and designing a team uniform. They were required to give an identity to their robot which they named Poseidon. They worked throughout their senior academic year and with the help of the undergraduates in the NU Chapter of the IEEE Robotics Club, developed their competition entry. Even this was not enough and the core of the team of students who elected to go to San Diego worked weekends and in some cases took time off from their jobs to further develop the robot to be competition worthy. Even with that diligent preparation, they still encountered problems as a key component failed after they arrived in San Diego. So they turned their hotel room into a workshop and worked day and night on the robot in order to be able to qualify. After making 8 attempts they finally demonstrated that their entry was capable of qualifying to compete. This was the objective for the first attempt of the Bot-Rodders.
During the week at the competition, while working on the robot at night and showing it to the public and the judges during the day while making and testing modifications, the promoted their achievement and Norwich university to all those interested in stopping at the tent. Our robot drew quite a crowd as it was the most innovative design at the competition. In fact the Norwich University Bot-Rodders were recognized for that characteristic and Norwich University was presented with a $500 check as substantial recognition of that achievement. This was above and beyond the expectations of a first year competition. This was only possible due to the focus and dedication of certain members of the team as well as the terrific support from the members of the David Crawford School of Engineering (DCSE) from the engineering dean and department chairs to the technicians and DCSE Administrative Assistant. All this support would not have been possible had it not been for the stage being set by Vice President of Academic Affairs and President Schneider. It is especially significant that the first recognition for Norwich University should be in the area of Innovation as Norwich has historically been a school of innovation in education.
This experience was valuable as the students learned not only how to publish their work in the public arena, they learned the skills of promotion as they presented to the crowd and the judges. They learned the intensity required to become competitive with anyone in the world. They learned the value of persistence that President Calvin Coolidge is so often quoted as expressing “Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan 'Press On' has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race.”
The main point of the competition is to promote the student professional careers. Our student made valuable contacts at the competition and even toured a leading underwater robotics company and were invited to interview for engineering positions.
Norwich University and the DCSE benefited as the competition experience was invaluable for the new initiatives in our leadership, professional entrepreneurship education and ESTEEM Educational Outreach program. This first year experience has been valuable in its own right. The real value is capitalizing on what was learned to promote the program so that the funding can be available to send a team next year.