Founded in 2006, Westwood Robotics “The Wolverines” is a close-knit high school team that consists of around thirty members and three mentors. Each year, they compete in competitions organized by FIRST® (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology), an international association that creates team-based robotics challenges. One such challenge is the FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC), where teams of high schoolers from around the world are tasked to design, develop, and fabricate a robot in approximately eight weeks to complete a unique objective.
FRC, however, is not just about robots. FIRST’s overall mission is to instill and inspire greater levels of respect and honor for science and technology, especially in today’s youth. In fact, the most prestigious award in FIRST Robotics is the FIRST Impact Award, which recognizes the team with the most significant community impact. These award-winning teams are honored for best representing a model for other teams to emulate and best embodying the mission of FIRST of creating and empowering the next generations of leaders in STEM.
So, in light of this, The Wolverines are very excited and proud to win the FIRST Impact Award at the FRC University of Rhode Island (URI) District Event on March 15th, 2025. This is what the judges had to say:
“This team worked ferociously to represent FIRST's core values and mission this season. They expanded their team, both in size and influence. This team excels in hands-on outreach, above and beyond showing off their robot. They created curriculum and made focused and successful efforts to recruit females into FIRST. Like their mascots, a pack of wolverines makes a big impact.”
To compete for the Impact Award, The Wolverines’ awards presentation team—Claire Peng, Landon Bayer, and Elizabeth Lowney—had to write a 10,000 character essay & 14 executive summaries; create a poster presentation; and present in front of & be interviewed by two sets of judges. Their presentation theme was inspired by their mentor Steve Harrington’s quote: “STEM education makes better robots; STEAM education makes better humans.” With the emphasis on the integration of Art in STEM, the group presented how The Wolverines’ hands-on outreach opportunities are able to nurture well-rounded “artistic-thinking” leaders who can solve problems with both technical expertise and creative vision. This mission is a team-wide effort, as all members in the robotics team’s outreach and technical subteams spearheaded and contributed to community initiatives like creating FIRST Lego League teams, “Spring Into STEM” collab with Girl Scouts, elementary school minicourses, town-wide robot demonstrations, and so much more.
This isn’t the first time the team received FIRST’s highest honor, as The Wolverines won the FIRST Impact Award at the 2024 FRC Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) District Event. That surreal moment marked a first in the team’s 19-year history, propelling them to new heights. Now, the team is thrilled to have secured another victory and remains committed to maintaining this momentum. Every member played a vital role in these historic achievements, and The Wolverines take immense pride in the team’s continuous collective efforts to inspire, innovate, and give back to the community.
Westwood Robotics “The Wolverines” is student-run, led by Technical Captain Landon Bayer, Business Captain Claire Peng, Technical Vice-Captain Anya Jiang, and Business Vice-Captain Elizabeth Lowney. Their hardworking adult mentors include Chris Aloisio, Steven Harrington, Dwight Meglan, and Jim Looney.
