SAN ANTONIO, TX (July 31) – The EDGE program (Early Development of General Engineering) wrapped up eight weeks of engineering and physics with a Sumobot competition and  graduation ceremony.
  
Some 20 local high school students participated in EDGE under the direction of SAC engineering instructor Klaus Bartels.  For the final project, students customized and programmed the Lego Mindstorms NXT robots using light, touch and ultrasonic sensors to measure distance and detect and react to opponents while trying to keep their robot from being pushed out of the competition ring.
 
Team Future, made up of high school students Kevin Ybarra, Mark Cruz and Valerie Gonzalez won the championship in the EDGE Sumobot competition July 28 at Chance Academic Center.
 
Second place went to the Phighters, John Rivera and Daniel Rodgers; and third place was team DDR made up of Adrian Castillo, Vernon Lymus and Ellen Solomon.
 
Graduation was held July 30 at McAllister Auditorium.     Special guests included Dr. Robert Zeigler, keynote speaker; Dr. Jessica Howard, vice president academics affairs, and Dr. Conrad Krueger, dean of arts & sciences, who presented students with certificates.     
 
“We are really proud of this program that was started a number of years ago by Dr. Dan Dimitriu,” Zeigler said.  He went on to commend students for committing eight weeks of summer vacation to education.  
 
Students Lauren Bracken, junior at Health Careers High School, and Christopher Luna, senior at Alamo Heights High School, told the audience what they had learned and enjoyed about the EDGE program.
 
EDGE sponsors include the U.S. Department of Education and the National Science Foundation. Students  from 10th to 12th grade earn college credit with classes  in Introduction to Engineering and Intro to Physics.   Field trips included the Toyota Tundra Plant, Challenger Learning (Space) Center, Lockheed-Martin and the Scobee Planetarium.
 
The EDGE students represented seven area school districts: Alamo Heights, La Vernia, Lackland, North East, Northside, San Antonio and South San Antonio. This was the seventh year for the program at SAC.