Bahrain – From No Robot to Award Winners in Two Days

For Team Bahrain, attending the FIRST Global Challenge wasn’t even on their radar until just four days prior to the event, leaving them with no time to build a robot. The team made the trek to Dubai and proceeded to open a FIRST Global robotics kit for the first time two days before their first match, knowing they would be competing against teams that had spent months fine-tuning their robots.

Although they felt that the odds were stacked against them, with the encouragement of their mentor, they set to work with the blueprints they had prepared. And in the wonderful spirit of Coopertition®, volunteers and other teams went out of their way to help Team Bahrain. Despite the difficult start, with a total of about 10 hours of work, the team’s robot held its own and won half of the game matches they played in.

“I told them, ‘Accept this challenge and see how it goes,” said the team’s mentor. “Imagine how, if you built this robot, at the end of the day how you would feel if you achieved that.’ And they made it real.”

In recognition of their accomplishment, the team was awarded the bronze medal for the Rajaâ Cherkaoui El Moursli Award for Courageous Achievement.

“Building a robot, competing, and winning some of the matches is not an easy thing. This experience has shown the students to believe in themselves and not limit themselves with anything. If we set a goal for ourselves, we can definitely achieve it.”

In Bahrain, the team was already involved in teaching robotics to young students, but their FIRST Global experience provided a unique opportunity that has equipped them even further to not only build up themselves, but also those around them.

“You learn today and you teach tomorrow. No matter how old you are, you can still teach, even if you’re just 15 years old.”



arAR