The Ponytail Posse Visits

High Monkey is a proud sponsor of an all-girls First Tech Challenge (FTC) Robotics team out of St. Paul Minnesota named The Ponytail Posse. The team is made up of high school girls with a drive and passion for robotics as well as everyday problem solving.

A little background on FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC) "The Mission of FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) is to inspire young people to be science and technology leaders, by engaging them in exciting Mentor-based programs that build science, engineering, and technology skills, that inspire innovation, and that foster well-rounded life capabilities including self-confidence, communication, and leadership. First Tech Challenge participants are challenged to design, build, program, and operate robots to compete in a head-to-head challenge in an alliance format."

Now that you know what First Tech Challenge is all about, we wanted to share some pictures and videos of when The Ponytail Posse came into the High Monkey office to demo their robot Stacy! The demo began with a PowerPoint presentation lead by some of the members of The Ponytail Posse. During the presentation, we learned the rules of the head to head challenge in which their robot would be competing in as well as some of the basics surrounding First Tech Challenge. One thing that was made abundantly clear about this group of young women during their presentation was their drive and passion! After finding out more about First Tech Challenge as well as the ins and outs of The Ponytail Posse we were ready to see the robot in full action.

During the demo of the robot we got to see exactly how the robot functioned as well as how the robot would be able to achieve some of the tasks involved in the head-to-head challenge. (See video at end of post) They even let us take the robot for a spin. The Ponytail Posse just recently participated in the MN FTC State Championship and received the Think award, which is awarded to the team who best understands the role of the engineering notebook in the design process. On top of receiving the Think award The Ponytail Posse will also be advancing to the next level, the North Super Regional Championship in Iowa and the girls are extremely excited!

We are extremely proud to be a sponsor of The Ponytail Posse and are wishing the girls the best of luck at their next big event!