Future Engineers Help Get Robotics Club Off the Ground [VIDEO and PHOTOS]

One might think that putting objects together out of Legos is just play but in the Hasbrouck Heights High School Robotics Club it is so much more.

“It’s really like a form of art,” explains Mike Pitkowski, the club’s vice president, adding that artists use paint to bring out their creativity and they use Legos to bring out their technical thinking as they try to determine how to make an object move and power it up.

Every Thursday after school, more than 30 students gather in the science room in the middle school wing to work on a challenge, building and creating something out of Legos. Some of the objects they create can be programmed with an attached computer device to move on their own. Students can put together objects such as a catapult using wheels and other attachments.

Sophomore student Simon Shkreli, who is president and founder of the club, takes a moment to demonstrate how the catapult works shooting a penny several feet from the desk into the supply room.

Schrekli was a part of the robotics club at his old school Saint Edmund in New York who won a state completion and got to compete in a national competition in Atlanta, Georgia. When he came to Hasbrouck Heights he hoped to bring a Robotics Club to the school for all to enjoy. He received a lot of support from his teacher Michael Binazeski who now serves as the high school advisor for the club. Shkreli said he is very thankful to the Nerd Herd at Saint Edmund’s of which he was a part of.

Pitkowski, a senior, also had an interest in being part of the Robotics Club and got on board with Shkreli to try to get the school administrators and Board of Education to support it. Binazeski said Dr. Mark Porto, superintendent, was very supportive of the club as well as the Board of Education and the club got the okay as well as funding for materials to get the club off the ground this year.

Both Shkreli and Pitkowski are interested in pursuing engineering as a career which being a part of the Robotics Club helps them explore. Pitkowski has already been accepted to NJIT and plans to major in architecture and mechanical engineering. Shrekli said he’s interested in attending NJIT as well.

Both say they are really appreciative of the support they’ve received from their administrators which also includes Principal Linda Simmons and their advisors, Mr. Binazeski along with Dave Rispoli and Dave Cassiere. “We can come up with the ideas but without their support we couldn’t get this accomplished,” Pitkowski said.

There was non-stop action in the science room on Thursday as students clustered into groups completing this week’s challenge of putting together go-carts out of Legos. Binazeski said the group is mostly made up of male students however some female students have shown an interest as well and have been joining in each week.

In addition to the engineering the students are learning there is also a connection to the students in the Web Design class. Web design instructor Robert Iarossi said there are plans to take the technical side of the  Robotics Club up a notch as they plan to work in some GPS into the programming for the devices the students create.

Also web design students Edward Frischkorn and Patrick McGrath, who take part in the Robotics Club, are putting together a website for the club.  McGrath said currently a basic website exists but there are plans to add more features such as a calendar to list meetings and they want students to be able to post photos and videos of their work to the site. McGrath said he also hopes to add a comments section to the site. Frishkorn said they also plan to design a logo for the club.