MARQUETTE – Things that have wheels. Things that throw balls. Things that require safety glasses.

They’re all robots, and they were part of Saturday’s Upper Peninsula FIRST Tech Challenge Robot-Scrimmage at North Star Academy.

Middle school teams scrimmaged in preparation for the state-qualifying competition in November, with high school teams also giving demonstrations.

McKenzie Halley, a senior at Marquette Senior High School, was a mentor to one of the groups that worked on a particular gadget: a launching mechanism to get balls into the center of a board.

The senior was there to help the younger students solve design problems.

“In order to get the balls into the center things, there’s a lot of parts and math to take into consideration, how to get them actually high enough to get them to be top edge,” Halley said.

Lily Dixon, a sixth-grader at Bothwell Middle School, had a bit of a struggle with her robot as well, although overcoming challenges was part of the event.

“It fakes the wheels, because as they’re going, they’re somehow sticking to the ground and they’re peeling off and they’re trying to get them to grip up the ramp so we can put the cap balls in, but it’s not working,” Dixon said.

If a non-participant didn’t understand that, that’s OK. Dixon did.

Laura Farwell, coach of the North Star Robogators, watched the kids participate in the event, which was about getting the middle schoolers ready for their Nov. 12 competition in Petoskey.

“It’s an opportunity for them to see the other teams, what they’re doing, realize that they’re not the only ones,” Farwell said. “There are a lot of rules to follow and keep track of, so they make the mistakes here and not in Petoskey where they could get disqualified and penalized.”

The event also is an outreach effort to show the community what’s happening in the robotics world, especially in the Upper Peninsula.

“It’s the first time in the U.P. we’ve had K through 12 programs represented in a single event,” Farwell said.

She said the robotics program focuses on STEM – science, technology, engineering and math. But it’s much more.

“It’s also about active learning, not passive learning, which would be like in the classroom,” Farwell said. “So it’s very hands-on. It’s about learning how to work with team members. The coaches don’t do it. The students do.”

That means resolving conflicts, although the students are supervised.

Farwell also said students have to present their robots to a panel of judges. At the high school level, there’s also a fundraising component.

“So in a way, it’s like running a small businesses for the high schoolers,” Farwell said.

Sponsors also were essential in supporting the groups. Sponsors for the Robogators included Actobiotics, the Community Foundation of Marquette County, DTE Energy, Econo Foods, Ford, Fox Marquette, Marquette Breakfast Rotary, Marquette West Rotary Foundation, Rotary Club of Marquette and Riverside Auto.

Supporting the Bothwell Blackrock Bots and Narwhals were the Community Foundation of Marquette County, Marquette Rotary West, Trimedia Environmental and Engineering Services LLC, GEI, Carpenters and Millwrights, Closner Construction, Operating Engineers 324, Kiwanis, American Association of University Women, Kathy Davis, Econo Foods, Cook signs, Trio Graphic Design and Advanced Center for Orthopedic.

Individuals also contributed by donating food and mentoring.

“Without community support, we wouldn’t exist,” Farwell said.

Whatever the outcome of the school year’s competition, in a way it doesn’t matter if a student is going to enter a robotics-related field after graduation.

“Whether they’re going to go into technology or not doesn’t really matter because the skills they’re learning here are going to prepare them for the workplace,” Farwell said.

Another purpose of Saturday’s event was to give everybody a chance at driving robots.

“They will learn they don’t want to drive in front of a crowd, and so we want everyone driving who wants to try,” Farwell said. “This is the time.”

Participants in the FIRST Lego League for grades four and five were to display and demonstrate their season’s progress while the league’s junior teams for students in kindergarten through third grade were to display their models and what they learned.

For example, the Kragle Krackers showed off their LEGO hummingbird, while the Lego Power team exhibited an American robin and the Tornado Builders displayed their blue jay.

The birds were fairly anatomically correct, but possibly the true value of their exhibits came with the facts the kids gave about their chosen subjects.

What did they learn? Apparently, more than creating an object with LEGOs.

Wrote the Kragle Krackers about their hummingbird: “Bunnies live in the woods and they eat berries. Bunny poop can have seeds in it that grow more plants that the bees and hummingbirds need to live.”

So, the scrimmage did teach more than robotics.

Christie Bleck can be reached at 906-228-2500, ext. 250.