About the MSJA Robotics Team, the FIrebirds:Aunique opportunity for students to participate in an intense nationalcompetition that demands a commitment to team building and requires avery broad range of talents and interests. We need students interestedin art, business, science, writing and math. If you enjoy a challenge,please join us!
News for 2009
April 3-5, 2009: Ham Radio Project!
The FIREBIRDS will be leading Mount students and parents in a Ham Radio Project! This will run concurrently with the Volleyball Marathon in honor of the school's 150th Anniversary celebration. Ham radios will be set up in a classroom with antennas being strategically placed outside. For a short time on Friday as the VB marathon is already running, they will operate the equipment and make as many contacts with other ham radio stations as possible. A full scale effort will be underway on Saturday and Sunday during the day. Stations that are contacted will eventually send a postcard confirming their contact with the Mount and the FIREBIRDS, in turn, will send a certificate that the girls are designing to commemorate the ham radio event during the school's anniversary year.
The Firebirds were one of six teams selected out of over 1,300 teams in the U.S. to do video introductions during the FIRST kick-off on Saturday, January 3rd. A Firebird team member introduced the FIRST executives in a ten second introduction to a "Who Wants to be an Engineer" game show. We shot it in the shop basement during break and sent it in to FIRST. The kick-off transmission was viewed by hundreds of thousands of people, worldwide, and was very exciting.
Firebirds’ Inspiring AchievementCongratulations to the Mount’s Robotics team, the Firebirds, which won the Engineering Inspiration Award at the FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) Philadelphia Regional Robotics Competition held March 27-29 at Drexel University.
The award celebrates outstanding success in advancing respect and appreciation for engineering within a team’s school and community. This is the second-highest award a team can garner.
The official award reads:
“This team from a small school goes to great lengths to inspire and recruit students. As soon as school starts in the fall, they pepper the building with fiery videos and announcements. Their volleyball marathon and quiz-kid approach to fundraising is highly effective. Their international outreach has sent robots across the ocean. They fire up the new competition with donated robots.”
The Firebirds were invited to attend the national Robotics competition in Atlanta, GA.
The Firebirds worked very hard this year, and thank our gracious hosts, the Sisters who live in the convent, who endured another short basement invasion!
The Firebirds have more than shown the rest of the competing teams (99% of which are boys' teams) who attended this regional competition from around the USA, the meaning of the word
respect!
Click here to view the Firebirds Inspiring Team Poster
with many thanks to Mark Paviglianiti for his assistance and inspiration!