Introduction and edited stories contributed by Susan Curnow Breedlove, Camden High Community Liaison
Introduction
Throughout the last dozen years, I have written articles for Camden News about the successful robotic program at Camden High School (formerly Henry High). For this issue of Camden News, I have focused on the current principal leaders of the program, Senior Mentor Jack Skogen, volunteer of 16 years, and Lead Mentor Carly Robison, in her third year. Alumnus Bella Luna and Camden High Teacher Brian Vats-Fournier have also volunteered to assist the team this school year.
I find it particularly admirable when an individual dedicates so much of their time to be a volunteer. Jack Skogen’s on-going involvement with the building of the Herobotics program over 16 years has been instrumental for its sustainability. He has been impacting the lives of countless youth and has no plans to quit. Carly Robison recently received the robotics Upper Midwest Volunteer of the Year Award for her dedication and service. Jack and Carly meet with students 4-5 days a week and Saturdays, gather with the team in the summer, and chaperone competition trips. The group is bound together like a family. They are currently celebrating the achievement of team member Sean Vang, selected as FIRST Robotics Competition’s Dean’s List Finalist as an outstanding young leader. He will travel to Houston for the national competition in April.
Intriguing topics covered in these stories show how two leaders, Skogen and Robison, got interested in technology, in creating robots, and in mentoring young people. I wanted to know what they have done to develop robot building skills. Who were the people that influenced their pathways in life? And, I especially wanted to know what motivates these two to spend so much of their daily life guiding youth in preparation for the future.
Note: Google “Herobotics” to learn more about past articles about the program and its history at Camden High. Herobotics is a member of FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology), an international youth organization that operates several competitions. Its expressed goal is “to develop ways to inspire students in engineering and tech fields.”
Jack Skogen – Volunteer Mentor at Camden High School for sixteen years
Story by Jack Skogen, edited by Susan Curnow Breedlove
I grew up in the city of Detroit Lakes as one of three children of Calvin and Dorothy Skogen. My father was a small business owner and my mother homemaker and they were very supportive of me building model rockets in the basement! Elementary and secondary schools I attended were: Lincoln Elementary, Holmes Junior High and Detroit Lakes Senior High school from which I graduated. My wife and I raised our family of five in our home in Northeast Minneapolis in the Sheridan community. Our daughters Elsa, Eden and Emilia attended Camden High (formerly Henry High); Emilia was valedictorian of her class and a captain of the robot team. Kirsten and I now live in Columbia Heights.
My wife Kirsten Rome started teaching at Camden in 2008 in the CTE (Career Tech Ed) Department. She is very good at volunteering me for things and that is how I began mentoring Team 2500 Herobotics. She saw my skill sets and felt that they would be useful.
I attended Minneapolis School of Art of Design, worked with the Vikings exhibit at the Minneapolis Institute of Art, attended U of M archeology and anthropology courses and served as a teacher’s assistant at the U’s Rarig Center Theater Arts Dept. I have built props, sets, and scenery for area theatres including Circus Juventas and interned at St. Paul’s Children’s Museum in their exhibit fabrication shop. I became a certified welder through completing the MCTC (Minneapolis Community and Technical College) program, and I earned a diploma in cabinetry from St. Paul College. I’ve worked in commercial and residential remodeling. Currently I am employed at Johnson Screens, a leading manufacturer of stainless steel and PVC well screens for water well, environmental, and oil and gas applications, located in New Brighton, as a machine operator. My extensive industrial and OSHA safety trainings have been so important in assisting the students of Camden’s robot teams through the past 16 years.
As Senior Mentor of the Herobotics Team my primary roles are in the use of machine and hand tools, advising students in building and designing, mentoring and as a team historian. Currently I co-mentor with Carly Robison. We work together as a team, each guiding students with our individual skills. We rotate days as mentors with the student members 4-5 days a week after school at Camden High and the whole crew meets on Saturdays. Currently, we are building a robot for two competitions. We traveled to Grand Forks, ND for the Great Northern Regional Robotics Competition in March and will be competing in the North Star Regional at Mariucci Arena at the U of M on April 2-5.
My hopes for the Herobotics students are that they will gain more skills and have more confidence in themselves and their abilities in their current lives and the future.
This will be my 16th year coaching and mentoring the Herobotics Team at Camden High School. I have met amazing young people and that’s what brings me back.
Carly Robison – Volunteer Mentor at Camden High School for three years
Story by Carly Robison, edited by Susan Curnow Breedlove
I grew up in Silicon Valley, California, with a software engineer/engineering manager dad and a stay-at-home-turned-artist mom. I went to all-girls’ middle and high schools, doing robotics and learning computer science at both. I’ve always been a STEM (Science Technology, Engineering, Math) kid, participating in school science fairs, math, theater and tech. My first experience with robotics was as a 5th grader in FLL (FIRST LEGO League), and I brought FLL to my middle school. In high school I joined the existing FRC (FIRST Robotics Competition) team (1700) and pushed for, and enrolled in, curricular computer science classes. I led the programming and electronics sub team my senior year and drove the robot, including into a wall and over my foot.
My partner and I moved to Minnesota in April 2022 and purchased a house in Minneapolis. I was looking to get involved with the FIRST community in the Fall when my friend Elle Caldow, a physics teacher at Camden High, connected me to the team. I brought skills obtained as a graduate of Caltech (“California Institute of Technology”) with a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science. I worked for an API Frameworks Team making toolkits for software. Currently I am a software engineer on a planner team for Waymo which makes autonomous cars and operates a taxi service in several cities.
My roles with Camden High’s Herobotics Team are mainly as Lead Mentor, designer, programmer, fundraiser, project and business manager. My co-mentor Jack Skogen focuses more of the build side; we’re both involved in designing and reviewing work with students. As a project manager I make sure students set goals, track our progress, and make adjustments to the parameters and goals to make sure we are satisfied with the outcome. I always step back when students express interest in something I’m doing, and I sometimes intentionally make gaps for students to fill in. It’s been a real joy to see the students grow over the last couple years!