My Robotics Mentor who led me to my first competition win was a high school student by the name of Rohit Narayanan. He told me that everything I need to learn in life I will learn in our after school robotics club, which I have found to be quite true. He inspired me to pay it forward.
Some of my most rewarding experience in Robotics is in mentoring students who are just eager to learn and improve. The most illustrious of my mentoring career was coaching a Middle School team during COVID-19 to win the Design Award at VIQC Worlds in 2021. While mentoring for wins is the most direct testament on effectiveness, I have found building skills and character of my mentees equally rewarding. This is the reason I continue to coach teammates in FRC and junior members in the VRC, VIQC, and FLL competitions over the years.
I believe in going in-depth with teaching hard skills even though this is a very time-consuming process. Without skills it is not possible to problem-solve. I focus on ensuring my mentees understand why something should be designed a certain way so they can apply their abilities to new scenarios. At the same time, I emphasize the importance of team work and personal responsibility.
I am a big proponent of learning from failures. When competition seasons are long, such as for FLL, VIQC and VEX, I encourage teams to test our their solutions and make multiple iterations so they learn to identify design blindspots and take charge of their own learning. Where competition season is short, such as for FRC, I design off-season projects and scenarios that tests collaboration and pitfalls with many opportunities for oft-made mistakes. This builds up critical problem solving skills of the team. Ultimately, it is the personal growth of each member that is the most important in mentorship programs.
During the FRC competition season, I am deep in the trenches and shift my attention to cultivating a healthy team culture. I believe the team has to be vested in the final product and put away personal jealousy for the best results. Putting the team above personal egos or whims is critical to the team's ultimate success and ensures the survival of a strong team acrosss seasons.
2025 - VEX IQ Challenge Singapore National Innovate Award
2024 - VEX IQ Challenge Singapore National Excellence Award (World Qualifying)
2024 - VEX IQ Challenge Singapore National Design Award
2024 - VEX IQ Challenge Online Challenge Asian Cultural Exchange Winner (World Qualifying)
2024 - VEX IQ Challenge Online Challenge Reverse Engineering Challenge Finalist
2023 - VEX Robotics Competition Taipei National Judges Award
2023 - VEX IQ Challenge Singapore National Excellence Award (World Qualifying)
2023 - VEX IQ Challenge Singapore National Teamwork Champion Award
2023 - VEX IQ Challenge Singapore National Design Award
2023 - VEX IQ Challenge Singapore National Judges Award
2023 - VEX IQ Challenge Singapore National Robots Skills Award
2022 - FIRST Robotics Competition Port Hueneme Judges' Award
2022 - VEX Robotics Competition Online Challenge Career Readiness Finalist
2022 - VEX Robotics Competition Online Challenge Girl Powered Finalist
2022 - VEX IQ Challenge World Championship Inspire Award
2022 - VEX IQ Challenge Singapore National Excellence Award (World Qualifying)
2022 - VEX IQ Challenge Online Challenge Girl Powered Finalist
2022 - FIRST Lego League Singapore National Gracious Professionalism Award
2022 - FIRST Lego League Singapore National 3rd Place Innovation Project Award
2021 - VEX IQ Challenge World Championship Design Award (2nd Highest Judged Award at World Championship)
2021 - VEX IQ Challenge Singapore National Robot Skills Award (World Qualifying)
2021 - VEX IQ Challenge Online Challenge STEM Research Project Winner (World Qualifying)
2021 - VEX IQ Challenge Caution Tape Classic Virtual Judges Award
2021 - VEX IQ Challenge Online Challenge "Make It Real" CAD Engineering Finalist
2021 - VEX IQ Challenge Online Challenge Teacher/Coach Fusion 360 Finalist