By Megan Ma

Hours before it was set to be packed and shipped to competition headquarters at San Jose State University, Girl Scout Troop 2868 tweaked the programming on their basketball-shooting robot for the Silicon Valley FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) robotics competition.

For six intensive weeks, the team met after school at the NASA/Ames Research Center lab creating a robot that could shoot and collect basketballs. To make the robot work, the girls had to first design the prototype - its appearance and how it would move using motors and electronics.

Wendy Holforty, a NASA senior research engineer, advised the team and was impressed with the experience. “The girls were exposed to basically anything you could do in engineering - electronics, computer programming, mechanical engineering. They had to program a controller to react to the input of a joystick,” she said.

NASA co-sponsors the team with the Girl Scouts and pays $11,000 for the entry fee, robot kit and parts.

This is the second all-girls team NASA has sponsored in partnership with the Girls Scouts. The goal of the robot games is to allow the girls to interact with engineers so they can see the connection between classroom instruction and real-world applications.

Although the Silicon Valley regional competition is not slated until March 16, the robot shipped Feb. 21 - and there was no way the Space Cookies, as they dubbed themselves, were going to miss the deadline. They are one of only a handful of all-girls teams out of 1,133 entries in the FIRST robotics competition.

Among the team’s 12 local high school girls, few had any experience in robotics or electronics. But from design and engineering to building the prototype, they quickly learned the basics with the help of NASA engineering mentors and volunteers.

Jeannice Samani of Los Altos, whose 15-year-old daughter Jassamnie is on the team, supervised the group. The process, she said, was democratic, with each girl bringing her individual talents and creativity to the table. With only six weeks to design, construct and test the robot, all jobs were important.

“Everyone found a niche on the team,” Samani said. “And they were all remarkably committed.”

In addition to engineering skills, the girls also learned accounting, marketing and fund-raising, said Samani. In fact, in the event the girls advance to the April nationals in Atlanta, they have their bases covered. The older Girls Scouts have brokered a deal with local Brownie troops to share profits on Girls Scouts cookies they plan to sell.

FIRST is a multinational non-profit organization that works to inspire students to view science, math and engineering in a new and fun way.

Companies that support FIRST build community relations and corporate awareness and gain team building and training opportunities for employees.

For more information on the competition, visit www.usfirst.org/robotics/eventlist. To be a corporate sponsor, email frcteams@usfirst.org