Falcon BEST Robotics is located in the rural town of Bowling Green, Ohio. Bowling Green is located just south of Toledo in the northern part of the state. Falcon BEST services teams from all over the state of Ohio and generally have between 12 to 18 teams participate each year. They occasionally have requests from teams as far as Indiana and Kentucky, but generally all the competing teams come from the state of Ohio. 

Falcon BEST receives their funding from a variety of sources including industrial partners such as First Solar, Robex, and Lathrup Construction Engineering. However, their greatest support comes from the College of Technology, Architecture and Applied Engineering at Bowling Green State University. The university president, Dr. Rodney Rogers, and the vice provost, Dr. Joe Whitehead, are very supportive of the program and help orchestrate a lot of what happens throughout the season. Falcon BEST is lead by Resmi KrishnankuttyRema, hub director, Kari Storm, program coordinator, and Lisa Schaller, the field and purchasing coordinator. Together, they constantly pursue ways to improve and strive to make Falcon BEST the premier robotics competition program in the area. Because of the close relationship with Bowling Green State University, there is a vast pool of volunteers from various fraternities and sorority organizations, Thompson Scholars, and the sponsors who also provide assistance. .

Similar to other BEST hubs across the country, Falcon BEST is making strides to return to the pre pandemic numbers and the impact BEST has on their community. In 2019, nearly 1800 team members, families, volunteers, and community leaders convened on the campus of Bowling Green State University for its annual competition. 2019 was the highlight of the Falcon BEST tenure as it  transitioned to become a university-wide focused event.  This event was live streamed, televised, the mayor was in attendance, and all the unique components of the city and university came together. “It’s a really great experience,” says Kari Storm. After going virtual in 2020 and having experienced reduced numbers, Falcon BEST Robotics made a great return to in-person competition and are looking forward to pre-pandemic participation in seasons yet to come.

One of the unique things Falcon BEST Robotics does is that they offer an all-day conference on the day of the season kick-off.  At this event, students are able to receive training on video recording & editing, coding, soldering, and much more. Tours are provided of their Mechatronics lab and students get the opportunity to speak with industry professionals. Food is provided and teams really get an appreciation for the game theme and everything they need to be successful that season.

Hub Spotlight submitted by:

Hutto High School (Hutto, TX) – Jordan Garcia, Riley Kerkering, Scott Shepard, Maxwell Manskie

Montgomery BEST is a testament of resilience as it adapted and changed over the years. In the process, Montgomery BEST has run things a little different than other hubs around the country. Most recently, Montgomery BEST was the only hub in the nation who held an In-Person BEST Robotics competition during the COVID-19 outbreak of 2020. That year, nine teams began the season and seven teams actually competed in the Hub tournament at the end of the season. After the hub returned back to Montgomery, the greatest difficulties came from raising money for kits and supplies and getting enough people to understand what BEST Robotics is all about so they could recruit volunteers. Sponsorships come from the Missile Defense Agency in Huntsville, Alabama State University, the City of Montgomery, the County of Montgomery, and several local businesses in the area. Many of the judges are virtual nowadays. They try to get about 50 judges to help. And, an additional 50 volunteers are needed to run the in-person events, like kick-off and competition day.  They seek volunteers from Alabama State University, neighboring hubs, and former participants.

Montgomery BEST is also proud of the way in which they host their practice day. Two weeks before competition, they create quite the spectacle when they have “Mall Day”. Teams convene at the local mall to practice on the competition field. Mr. Sumner, hub committee member, says they “do it out in public so the town can see and help get the word out.”

At competition, they bring in a DJ, have fun activities, and make a huge public event out of it. 25 teams took part in the 2019 competition when Alabama State University first took over. Due to the pandemic, only 7 teams finished the season in 2020 when they competed in-person. The numbers went back up in 2021 with 17 teams competing in last year’s event. Since the host university changed so much, the hub went through many different hub directors. Each time it was hosted by Auburn University, the hub director was Mary Lou Ewald. At Huntingdon college, Dr. Sid Stubbs was the hub director. In 2019 and 2020, Dr. Dean was the hub director, and in 2021, Dr. Jones was the hub director. Since Auburn University has so much experience with hosting a hub, they still help a lot with Montgomery BEST, and they host the South’s BEST regional championship for the area.

Even though the Montgomery hub had faced many challenges with the lack of funding and students, they still pushed through the 2020 season. One of Mr. Sumner’s most memorable moments is just being there with the kids, watching them grow, develop, succeed, and fail. Many of his students went on to start their own companies and create amazing inventions. With BEST Robotics, Mr. Sumner was able to provide students with the opportunity and the students continually surprise him with their ingenuity.

Hub Spotlight submitted by:

Hutto High School (Hutto, TX) – Gary Choice, Andrew Riggan, Ryan Postlewait, Steve Wiley

The Capitol BEST hub was founded in 2001 by Greg Young, an electrical engineer currently with Advanced Micro Devices in Austin, Texas. This hub was formed to cover Travis and Williamson county regions, however they also accept schools from other Central Texas areas. Capitol BEST is entirely volunteer run. Generous sponsors like Best Buy, Texas State University, Intel, Whataburger, Home Depot, and the Texas State History Museum help keep BEST Robotics free for any team who wishes to participate. Together, these partners and other contributors provide the hub with a budget of around 20,000 dollars every year.

Mr. Young had his start with BEST Robotics in 1995 with the Collin County Hub, located in the North Dallas/Plano area. In 2000, he moved to Austin and started Capitol BEST the next year. Also at this time, Mr. Young participated on the board of directors for BEST Robotics, Inc., and eventually became the Director of Operations for BEST Robotics nationally.

With the donations Capitol BEST receives, the goal is to host its annual competition with about 28 teams. However, when Mr. Young first moved to Austin, he had to start the program from scratch. In 2000, he worked at Motorola and told his coworkers about the great robotics competition program that BEST offers. Mr. Young’s coworkers jumped on board and helped get donors together for the competition. Some of the same volunteers (and former teachers and students) are still helping with Capitol BEST today (22 years later); Kenneth Burch, William Polanco, Chris O’quin, Tony Cacciola, Paul Ziegler, to name just a few . Over the years, many of the sponsors also provided volunteers to help make Capitol BEST what it is today.  “It’s a blessing every year just to be able to continue and to offer the program at no cost to schools.” 

When looking back at memorable moments, Mr. Young had many to share. However, when you have a philosophy of following through no matter what, you’ll come across obstacles many would shy away from. “Not a lot of people understand or realize that there is a lot of effort in setting up and preparing for the event.” Pulling all-nighters and hanging banners 30 feet in the air from a scissor-lift are just part of the story. One year in 2007, Mr. Young recalls a memory that sticks with him to this day. 

Hub Spotlight provided by:

Hutto High School (Hutto, TX) – Robert Peller, Freddy Blok, Caleb Sterling, Andres De Lira

Dallas Texas or “Big D” anchors the fourth largest metropolitan area in the United States. Dallas is known for its competitive environment from professional sports leagues to Friday night football. Competitive sports are not the only activities sponsored by the UIL (University Interscholastic League) in Texas. UIL sponsors competitions for high schools in everything from band competition to debate. In 1993, BEST (Boosting Engineering Science and Technology) Robotics held their first game “PVC Insanity” just north of the Dallas Fort Worth Metroplex in Sherman, Texas.

Sponsorship and volunteers are an important part of any nonprofit organization, and that includes Dallas BEST. Their primary sponsorship, funding, and main sources of volunteers have been Texas Instruments and Raytheon. Dallas BEST boasts some very talented volunteers filling key positions. Alison Brown is the volunteer coordinator and scorekeeping wrangler; Cissy St John is the Consumable Kit Maven and Timothy Chung and Kristen Graber help with returnable kits. Elisa Miller is Head Judge; Stephen Wynne does field construction and transport, and he also referees at Dallas and Texas BEST. Ann Balaban does event coordination and setup. Elisa Miller mentioned that “[Ann Balaban] certainly got her and a lot of others from the professional organization the Society for Technical Communication (STC) involved [with Dallas BEST] primarily in judging the engineering notebooks.” The hub has had many outstanding volunteers and teachers helping the program over the years. They recognize Pete Lohstreter, who was an outstanding BEST supporter at the Hockaday School for many years; by naming the Outstanding Teacher Award in his honor. Another exceptional long-time judge, Gary Suder always volunteered whenever anyone needed help.

One thing that sets apart Dallas BEST is their student and teacher awards. Students nominate their teachers and vote to choose the Pete Lohstreter Outstanding Teacher Award. The Graduating Senior Award is similar, but instead, teachers nominate their students. Dallas BEST is very proud of the diversity of the competing teams. “We’ve got amazing diversity, and the students are from just everywhere” says Elisa Miller. Jon Spangler adds “the team demographics run the full spectrum, there are country teams, city teams and everything in between.” Students are from many different backgrounds and at the competition, they all seamlessly unite to compete.

The Dallas BEST team works hard to produce a quality program, but sometimes unexpected things happen. You may not want to drive behind them. “One of the sections of the field fell out of my truck because I didn’t put the latch down or something like that, so the door slowly rolled up, and four miles down the road the door was all the way rolled up and then a piece falls out,” said Bill Rock.

Another time, Jon Spangler was hauling the game field on Interstate 635 when he looked in the mirror and saw the V-shaped windscreen on the trailer meant to protect the field suddenly start to rise up and float away.  He was slowing down as much as he could but couldn’t prevent the wind screen from blowing off the trailer. Fortunately, it landed on the side of the road and did not hit another vehicle.  Another time a base from a field piece fell out, and at game day the rebuilt base featured an automobile tire track across it.  Mary Helmick joked “lesson learned, don’t drive behind Dallas BEST people while they are hauling field materials.”

The Dallas BEST organization and all of the volunteers are committed to supporting all of the schools as they learn about designing, building, programming and driving their robots, as well as how to write an engineering notebook, give a marketing presentation and build an information booth. “One of the coolest things about BEST is that we get to see these kids grow into leaders with their continued participation,” said Elisa Miller. “Some of them come back as volunteers after they graduate from college,” added Bill Rock.

Hub Spotlight submitted by Trenton High School (Trenton, TX):

Abigail Casey             Class of 2024

Caleb Crittenden         Class of 2024

Georgia BEST Robotics is based in Atlanta, Georgia. They service the greater Atlanta Metro Area and the surrounding suburbs. When Georgia BEST started in 2003, its founder, Glenn Allen, was a professor at Southern Polytechnic State University.  He got hooked on everything that was BEST and sought to bring the community together. Driven by Mr. Allen’s energy, BEST Robotics was a huge hit and took the city of Atlanta by storm. Georgia BEST was a great success until 2012, when Mr. Allen passed away. Over the next three years, Georgia BEST continued to be run by Kennesaw State University, a local college,until a group of student alumni received news that KSU would no longer be able to oversee the competition and decided to take over the leadership roles to ensure Georgia BEST could live on. 

One of the unique characteristics of Georgia BEST is that it is almost entirely run and organized by BEST Alumni. They do not have any formal ties to any higher education institutions. BEST Robotics made such an impact on these former BEST participants, that they would do anything to ensure future generations of students would have the same experience they did. BEST Robotics was their motivation. “When there were gaps that needed to be filled, it was such a no-brainer for so many of the alumni who were still in town to say that this needs to happen,” explained Matt Barulic. As new directors, they were so excited about taking over Georgia BEST that they once covered the entire playing field in glitter. Also because they are younger and having played the game themselves, they are able to incorporate newer technology and look at the game from an insider’s perspective.

The core group of volunteers for Georgia BEST are Hub Director Matt Barulic, Hub Coordinator Jessie Liu, Hub Advisor Dr. Debi Huffman, and planning committee members Dennis Jin and Brenden Smothers.. Together, they ensure every team that wants to participate is able.  Georgia BEST has a total of 15 state sponsors that allow them to offer this robotics competition at no cost for participating teams. H.B. Fuller is one of their primary sponsors.

Matt Barulic spoke about one of his favorite Georgia BEST memories. During the 2017 game, “Crossfire,”  there was a small mannequin made from string and PVC that needed to be saved from a fire. During one of the matches, the mannequin became untied. Instead of stopping the game and pausing everything, they created a fun scene where they performed CPR, trying to save his life and got the whole crowd involved. They had a wireless camera with a live feed displaying what happened onto the video screens. Everyone cheered and had a great time.

Hub Spotlight submitted by:

Hutto High School – Ethan Carrington, Isaiah Neilson, Almamy Diaby, Brenda De Castro

Kansas BEST Robotics, which got its start in 1999, was founded by Larry Fruitinger and Bob Unschied. This hub is located in the Heartland of America, Wichita, Kansas. They organize competitions for teams all around the state. Before the COVID-19 Pandemic, Kansas BEST would host about 28 to 30 teams. Since then, their numbers have dropped and they are slowly working their way to bring them back up. Given that Kansas is known to be the “Air Capital of the World,” many aviation companies such as Boeing, Cessna, Learjet, and others have called Kansas home. These companies sponsored the Kansas BEST’s events and provided many of their volunteers. Kansas BEST owes much of its success to its current sponsors, Army ROTC, Textron (Cessna & Beechcraft), Spirit Aerosystems, Evergy, AIAA, Ametek PDS, and SPEEA. Also, the College of Engineering and the Barton School of Business at Wichita State University have become critical partners in the Kansas BEST endeavor by providing venues, catering, print services, fundraising via their Foundation, and additional volunteers.

Kansas has several key volunteers, each with a special skill set. The responsibilities of hosting their competitions are divided up among several volunteers so that it is not left up to just one person running the entire event. Hub Director, Linda Manfull, has served as a volunteer for nearly 20 years, and has been director for the past few years.  She worked at Boeing in information technology and later moved to Spirit Aerosystems. Some other top volunteers are Lee Ann Youse, Brian Jaax, Jeremy Marshall, Don Brushwood, John Matthew, and others who have become invaluable to running a great competition each year. 

Kansas BEST helped create two highly successful games: “Just Plane Crazy” in 2008 and “Bet the Farm” in 2016. “Just Plane Crazy” was based on airplane manufacturing and “Bet the Farm” had an agricultural theme. Lee Ann and Linda both felt that “Just Plane Crazy” was their favorite, most memorable game. Lee Ann says that, “Wichita feels like they are the center of aviation, and they are. . . To have something to do with their theme here in this town, I’m sure that made them very, very excited.”

They feel that one of the greatest things to see each and every year is how it all somehow comes together. From a host perspective, the playing field, venue, judging, volunteers, kit distribution, and game day all begin with a thousand little tasks and somehow come together to work. From a team perspective, you have students and mentors who are given this monumental task, and even when things don’t work out as planned, other teams come together to offer assistance and guidance. There are times when opposing teams have to come together to make a product. “This is how it really is in the engineering world,” says Lee Ann.

Hub Spotlight submitted by:

Hutto High School (Hutto, TX) – Eddy Cruces, Isaiah Johnson, Gus Blomstrom, Brandon Gonzalez

David Kwast has been the Cowtown BEST hub director since 2013. David’s first exposure to BEST Robotics was as a coach for his son’s high school team. Flying under the radar as a new team, this team went on to win 1^st place at Cowtown BEST by a single point. He fondly recalls working with the students that season and how excited they were in competing. David is often asked by other parents how to get their children involved in robotics. He recommends BEST Robotics as well as FIRST and VEX. Many of his former students have gone on to earn technical degrees. One student became a Disney Imagineer before ultimately landing as a product development engineer. As a hub director, he is confident that the Cowtown BEST hub volunteers and competition inspire students to seek STEM degrees in college.

The CoCo BEST Leadership Team boasts a great group of volunteers that are highly skilled in all aspects of staging the game each year.  In addition to acquiring sponsorship and managing hub resources, the leadership team must reserve kickoff and game sites, build the game field for each year’s individual competition, manage the returnable and consumable kits, and comply with all BEST policies and procedures while hosting the CoCo BEST hub competition.  The hub also provides mentors in engineering or marketing if a team requests assistance with a particular issue during the season.  A list of the CoCo BEST A Team and their roles follows this article.

  CoCo BEST is always seeking new volunteers to step up as some board members and key volunteers get closer to the age of retirement.  Joining CoCo BEST can be very rewarding as they have had some amazing success with students.  For example, a specific student wasn’t sure of the direction they wanted to go until approached by a teacher and given the opportunity to join BEST Robotics.  Through this student’s experience in competing in BEST Robotics, they discovered a passion for engineering.  This student has gone on to become an engineer.

2022 Collin County (CoCo) BEST A-Team

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