Oakland Students Building Robots and Solving Challenges
First-year engineering students at Northeastern’s Oakland campus showcased their Cornerstone of Engineering projects by building and programming self-driving robots to navigate mazes.
This article originally appeared on Northeastern Global News. It was published by Isabel Sami – Contributor. Main photo: First-year engineering students on Northeastern’s Oakland campus work on self-driving robots. Photos by Ruby Wallau for Northeastern University
First-year engineering students showcase cutting-edge robotics projects on Northeastern’s Oakland campus
OAKLAND, Calif. — At the start of the Cornerstone of Engineering showcase at Northeastern University’s Oakland campus, Kyle Tivnan’s robot was stalling.
He and his teammate, both Global Scholars in their first semester at Northeastern, had spent more than 100 hours building and rebuilding their robot, Frank the Tank, a small, motorized box on wheels programmed to traverse a series of cardboard mazes.
Following the guidance of assistant teaching professor Nicole Batrouny, students programmed their robots to evaluate the upcoming path and turn left or right depending on obstacles ahead. Batrouny, known as “Dr. B” by students, designed the showcase to bring together two months of robotics development for her students.
Working in pairs, the teams put their hand-built robots to the test, employing two programming languages, one graphics software and hours of design practice. The robots were challenged to drive straight, navigate a predetermined maze, then follow three mystery mazes.
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First-year engineering students on Northeastern’s Oakland campus work on self-driving robots. Photos by Ruby Wallau for Northeastern University
In the first challenge, Tivnan and his partner had a functioning robot. By the third challenge, the robot malfunctioned. The team rebuilt Frank the Tank multiple times, Tivnan said, adding another sensor to its side and changing the logic behind their code.
In the last stretch of class, something clicked. Frank the Tank sprung to life and completed the course, all on its own.
“It felt great,” Tivnan said. “My partner and I had spent a lot of time in the last two weeks really diving in on it and doing a lot of error analysis. It was really good to see it pay off in the end.”
The Cornerstone of Engineering program on the Oakland campus follows Northeastern’s first-year engineering curriculum, but the showcase last week was Batrouny’s idea.
“I wanted it to be a carnival atmosphere,” she said. “Tomorrow we’ll do a little bit more reflecting, but yesterday it was just the chaos. That’s the fun of it, and there was a lot of celebrating yesterday as well.”
Was there a winner? No, Batrouny said, just progress.
Watching the 24 teams complete the challenges left her with a sense of pride as an educator.
“I was so proud and excited, and also running around like a chicken trying to witness a lot of the mazes, which I was really glad to see,” she said. “I got to see a lot of joy, and I hadn’t fully appreciated the range of approaches until I could see them all at once. The robots are all the same parts, but there’s still at least 24 different ways to solve the same problem.”
Read full story at Northeastern Global News