FIRA Frontier Camp (FFC) 2018

Call for participation

3rd-5th August, 2018 // AI Robotics Hub, Taichung, Taiwan

Hosts: FIRA, Central Taiwan Science Park Bureau MOST Taiwan

Organizers: FIRA Taiwan Chapter, ITRI (AI Robotics Hub), Robotics Society of Taiwan, National Kaohsiung University of Science Technology

Co-Organizers: Taichung City Government, Feng Chia University

Sponsors: Goodway Machine Corp.

Important Dates

31st May 2018

Deadline for submission of qualification material

15th June, 2018

Notification to qualified participants

30th June, 2018

Deadline for early-bird registration

14th July, 2018

Deadline for regular registration

Introduction

FIRA Frontier Camp [FFC] was first started in 2017. The concept of the camp was developed based on feedback from former participants and teachers. It is similar to the International Humanoid Soccer Robot Summer School – a similar event for researchers and graduate students interested in humanoid robotics – that was organized by Prof. Jacky Baltes and Prof. Kuo-Yang Tu.

The motivation of the camp is to provide a unique opportunity to learn the fundamentals of robotics. The focus is on basic problem solving strategies, system development, testing, and debugging.

It must be stressed that the goal of the school is not to directly improve the chances of winning the following FIRA competitions. In fact, the lecturers and coaches will not be directly involved in the following FIRA competition as much as possible and will be told not to provide tricks and hints for the coming competition.

The school will also try and be as agnostic to the choice of development environments. That is, students should be able to participate using the Lego Mindstorms environment, the Taibotics software, or their own custom environment. Therefore, students must bring their own laptops and robots and must be well versed in the use of their development environment.

The instruction language in the Frontier Camp is English, so students must be able to understand simple English instructions.

To allow students a better chance to make friends and share their experiences, they will be teamed up with other children – ideally from a different country.

Each team will be supervised by a coach.

Curriculum

The Frontier Camp focuses on project based learning. There will be short lectures (about 1 hr in duration) that introduces the theory and fundamentals of robotics.

Following students will be asked to use their own development environment and robot to solve a part of this system.

In the first year, the curriculum will focus on physics of motion, mechanics, algorithm design, software development, and debugging techniques.

Social Program

We have also planned a social program on the campus. The teams will participate in a scavenger hunt and similar games to foster collaboration and friendship.

 

Qualification

Each participant must submit their own qualification material in English. Please provide a 1 – 2 page description of your previous experience, your current robot system and development environment, and your interest in robotics. In addition, participant personal data, such as name, school, address, phone, email, etc, is also included.

Submit your material as a pdf file to the Camp Director, Prof. Kuo-Yang Tu ([email protected]).

Registration Fees

The following fees include registration fee, tuition costs, teaching materials, accommodation at the Feng Chai University dormitory, and cafeteria meals (breakfast, lunch and dinner).

Early bird (14th July) : $350 USD per person

Regular (21st July) : $450 USD per person

General Chair: Prof. Kuo-Yang Tu [email protected]

Contact Persons: Christine Kim [email protected]

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