NERD Spark 9312, based out of Albion and Canton, Michigan, is a robotics team that competes in the globally recognized program, FIRST Robotics. FIRST develops students’ problem solving and communication skills through hands-on experiences with science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). The competition aspect of FIRST challenges students to build and compete with a self-made robot to complete the designated tasks in the annual game.
2025 marks NERD Sparks third year of competition and their third year of qualifying for the World Championship. Reaching this level of competition requires outstanding performance at the District and Regional levels. At Regionals, the team ranked 28th out of 528 teams. Only the top 86 teams from Michigan qualify to get to go to FIRST Championships aka Worlds. To put this accomplishment further into perspective, robotics team member, Ian Verbeke shared that there are about 8,000 active teams and only 600 of those teams go to Worlds.
At Worlds, held in Dallas last month, the team was recognized in the Daly Division with the Judge’s Award. During the competition, the judging panel may decide that a team’s unique efforts, performance, or dynamics merit recognition yet do not fit into any of the existing award categories. Out of 600 teams at the World Championship, only 8 teams are honored with the Judges Award. The Judges said “This young team is moving forward with SPEED” and we agree!
Congratulations NERD Spark on your hard work and creativity!