KSS Robotics

Help Send a Kent Robotics Team to the World Championship!

Six students from Kent, Ohio have earned the opportunity of a lifetime—representing our state at the FIRST World Championship in Houston, Texas (April 29–May 2, 2026).

Our team, Charged Up #37348, is a FIRST LEGO League robotics team that meets 3–4 times each week at the KSS Robotics makerspace. Through months of hard work, innovation, and teamwork, we advanced from local and state competition to the global stage—where we will compete alongside teams from more than 50 countries.

Now, we need your help to get there.

What We Do

FIRST LEGO League isn’t just about building robots—it’s about solving real-world problems.

This year, our team took on a challenge that reached far beyond the competition field.

Our Innovation: The “Yeet-A-Latl”

As part of this season’s UNEARTHED theme, we partnered with Professor Metin Eren and Dr. Michelle Beber from Kent State University to tackle a real scientific problem in archaeology.

Researchers studying ancient tools like the atlatl (a spear-throwing device used for over 30,000 years) face a major challenge:

Human throws are inconsistent.

Inconsistent data makes scientific research difficult.

So we asked:

What if we could build a machine that throws like a human—but the same way every time?

That idea became the “Yeet-A-Latl.”

We designed and built a mechanical system that replicates human throwing motion—allowing researchers to collect consistent, reliable data about speed, force, distance, and accuracy.

This isn’t just a school project—our work has the potential to support real archaeological research and help scientists better understand how early humans lived, hunted, and developed skills.

️ What It Took

Meeting with university professors and engineering experts

Designing multiple prototypes

Learning CAD (Onshape) to model our system

3D printing and building custom parts

Testing, failing, improving—and trying again

Every team member played a role, contributing skills in programming, engineering, research, and presentation.

Why This Matters

Qualifying for the FIRST World Championship is a huge achievement—and a chance for our team to:

Represent Kent and Northeast Ohio on a global stage

Share our research with teams and experts from around the world

Compete at the highest level of youth robotics

Be inspired to pursue future careers in STEM

How You Can Help

Traveling to Houston comes with significant costs, including:

Transportation

Lodging

Registration fees

Equipment and materials

We are raising funds to make sure every team member has the opportunity to attend, regardless of financial barriers.

Be Part of Their Journey

Your support helps more than just a trip—it helps build future engineers, problem-solvers, and leaders.

Whether you donate, share this page, or cheer us on, you are part of our journey.

Thank you for believing in our team ❤️

Please help the young innovators in our local community for inventing a breakthrough technology in increasing solar panel efficiency while reducing water usage in cleaning solar panels. Team ‘Bionic Beasts’ received a championship finalist award and advanced to the Razorback FLL championship tournament at the University of Arkansas to represent the state of OHIO.

The Bionic Beasts is a F.I.R.S.T. Lego League team from Aurora(Leighton & Harmon) and Solon( Orchard Middle ) schools in Ohio. We have participated in the FIRST Lego League Challenge competition for the last two years. Friendly competition is at the heart of Challenge, as teams of students ages 9-16* engage in research, problem-solving, coding and engineering – building and programming a LEGO robot that navigates the missions of a robot game. As part of the Challenge, teams also participate in a research project to identify and solve a relevant real-world problem. This year's innovation project will explore where energy comes from and how it is distributed, stored, and used – and then put their superpowered creativity to work to innovate for a better energy future. This year 2022-2023 in Ohio, over 350 teams with 3500+ students competed at various regional and district levels before the top 40 teams competed for the opportunity to represent Ohio at the State Competition. This global competition takes place in over 100 countries, inspiring the minds of more than 280,000 participants worldwide. Team Bionic Beats secured prestigious championship awards in both regional and district tournaments and also secured a championship finalist award out of the top 40 teams in the state's competition. The team advanced to represent the state of Ohio at the University of Arkansas in the Razorback event(https://fllrazorback.com/) from May 18 to May 21st, 2023 where 80 teams from all states in the USA and several teams from countries across the world.

We estimate approximately $15,000.00 to send all 5 team members, 2 coaches and one parent of each kid to cover transportation, food and lodging. Ohio Education outreach is covering our registration fee of $1,500. This team is completely community-based and self-funded. The team is in the process of starting a GoFundMe page. We are reaching out to you to explore the possibility of you/your organization sponsoring our team. We would be happy to add your logo to our T-shirts and other merchandise as a sponsor.

Summary of the innovation project:

Energy lost from PV panels due to soiling, dirt and other pollutants ranges from 7% to 50% depending on geographical area. Cleaning solar panels currently is estimated to use 10 billion gallons of water annually. That is enough to supply drinking water for up to 2 million people. The team's goal is to improve solar panel efficiency while using less water. Existing methods like cleaning with soap/water brush, robots waste a significant amount of water and also damage ARC(anti-reflection coating) which is critical in improving solar panel efficiency. The Innovation project uses an intelligent liquid with nanotechnology to address both efficiency & water waste with a completely automated XYZ linear railing.

Please reach out to Brahma Somanchi or Venu Konduru for any questions. Thank you so much for allowing the team to present and considering us for sponsorship to go BIG.

Checks can be made out to KSS Robotics and can be mailed to the home address 530 Beljon Ln, Aurora OH 44202.

Sincerely

Bionic Beasts

Aryan Agarwal, Ashvik Papannagari, Karthi Somanchi, Sreethan Machana & Yash Konduru

Coaches: Brahma Somanchi & Venu Konduru