Mechanical engineering students Marissa Post, Jason Fishner and Adam Retersdorf will be honored for their
victory and talk about their adventures as participants in the television show Robot Rivals on Tuesday, June 1, from 5 to 7 p.m. in the
Reamer Campus Center Auditorium.
In addition, the show's producer, Larsen Jay,
will come to Union to premiere the final episode, which pits the Union team
against the University of Pittsburgh. The show was filmed last fall in Knoxville, Tenn., for the Do-It-Yourself Network.
Robot
Rivals involves challenging college teams
of engineering and science students to build robots to perform particular
tasks. Each team starts with the same tools and items from which to build,
including one “household item” such as a refrigerator. They are given a time
limit and the assistance of an “expert” in the robotics or engineering fields.
Union, which was one of 14 college teams, traveled twice to Knoxville to film a total of four episodes. Union won the
entire competition after defeating first Dartmouth, Princeton and the University
of Rochester. The final competition against the University
of Pittsburgh involved building a robot to maneuver through a maze and
collect keys to unlock a door. The Union team's other winning robots had to
rake leaves, pick vegetables, and play floor hockey.
The episodes featuring the Union team are
being televised throughout May and June (on Time Warner's digital cable channel
1065). The final episode will be aired on June 26 at 9 p.m. Visit the Do-It-Yourself network website at http://www.diynet.com/diy/shows_drob/0,2044,DIY_14305,00.html
for more information on the show and a program schedule.
For their victory, Union College was awarded $2,000 for its Engineering Department, and the students'
names will be put on a large electronic trophy that remains with the network.
The trophy will be on display at Tuesday's event.
Marissa Post, of Shakopee, Minn., and Adam Retersdorf, of Gloversville, are both seniors. Jason Fishner, whose home town is Long Valley, N.J., is a junior at Union.