The RoboDawgs

10/30/2026

Oh the places you will go! Flashback to April 2012, when these three young RoboDawgs were competing in the division semi-finals of the 2012 FRC World Championship in Atlanta. This team had played back from a 38th place finish at the West Michigan Regional FRC event to become an alliance captain at the World Championship. They are the highest performing RoboDawg team ever.

There are three remarkable young adults in this photo. From left, they are Morrie Cunningham, Mike Hepfer, and Alex Vazsonyi

Morrie completed two Bachelors degrees at Grand Valley State University, one in Mathematics and one in Computer Science. Today he’s a Full Stack Software Developer at Meritage Hospitality. He’s also the only RoboDawgs graduate who is currently a RoboDawgs Coach.

Mike is a graduate of Purdue University. While completing an Industrial Engineering degree, he also founded Purdue Orbital and was a founding father of Alpha Sigma Phi. He worked with the National Science Foundation and co-founded start-up Leo Aerospace. With Leo Aerospace, he was selected to participate in the Techstars Starburst Space Accelerator in Sydney, Australia. Today Mike is the Senior Product Growth Specialist at Second Order Effects, an advanced group of engineers working to solve the world’s most difficult problems by optimizing solutions beyond the first order.

Alex has a Bachelors degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Kentucky. He completed both a Masters Degree and earned his PhD in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Michigan. He completed doctoral and post-doc work in Plasma Science and High Temperature Physics and nonequillibrium Gas and Plasma Dynamics. Alex has worked at the Air Force Research Laboratory, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, He’s currently a Senior Space Technology Advisor at the Aerospace Corporation, a leading architect for the nation's space programs, supporting national security and fostering innovation in space.

Oh the places our RoboDawgs go!

10/30/2026

Our Grandville teams would really benefit from those returnables sitting in your garage. The number of cans and bottles dropped off this year is down 60% from last year and we know everything at the grocery store costs more this year. But if you can spare the dimes, we’d really appreciate the opportunity to care of those returnables for you. Drop off any time, 24/7, at the elementary robotics center (4874 Canal).

10/30/2026

Ten years ago today - we did it in a tent! There was not room in any gym in our school district, so the 2016 VEX Halloween Tournament was held in a tent!!

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10/29/2026

We had a Halloween VEX tournament in a tent!

10/26/2026

It is with heavy hearts that the RoboDawg coaches report the passing of Chuck Parks. Like many of us Chuck got his start as a Lego League coach. He was a coach for RoboDawgs VEX and Autonomous Boat Racing teams. He coached our most successful 6th grade Botball team, famous for beating dozens of high school teams in St.Louis and Washington DC. Chuck was active as an FRC coach for many years and traveled widely with the team. Behind the scenes, Chuck was the electrical engineer who developed multiple controllers and processors used by early RoboDawg teams. Also behind the scenes, he was a founder of the Grandville Academic Team Boosters, the not-for-profit that has raised millions of dollars in support of our Grandville Robotics teams.

Most of all Chuck was crazy, brilliant, “Big Bang Theory” personality. He was fun-loving and he had the biggest heart. He would give you the shirt off his back - and probably his pants and hat if you needed them.

There are not words for days like this, when we have lost a friend and colleague who really was bigger than life.

There will be a graveside service for Chuck on Thursday October 29, 3:30 at the Blythfield Memory Gardens in Belmont MI.
After that, there will be a celebration of Chuck's life from 4:15-6:30 (open house style) at the Corner Bar on Main Street in Rockford MI.

10/25/2026

10/23/2026

It's that time! Watch the first VEX V% event of the season, live from the Grandville Robotics Competition Center, sponsored by Westwood AI

Links below for the morning qualification rounds, afternoon qualification round, and the afternoon playoffs are listed below

https://www.youtube.com/live/KZHVys7jMvE?si=2kztz0uP81WzNvpt
https://www.youtube.com/live/gcRnkmrU0H8?si=7EnYva2OiveA6sLE
https://www.youtube.com/live/KUFNUrwlmKM?si=7XueZ3IMOwLF99QG

Broadcast of the playoff and Championship rounds at the Grandville ...

10/19/2026

Oh the places you will go! Flashback to fall, 2018, when young RoboDawgs were building and flying our early aerial drones. This photo came up in our memories today.

This photo brings to mind three young people who had amazing runs with the RoboDawg, competing all over North America. Each captained State Championship robotics teams. And look at where they went!

Owen completed a Bachelors of Civil Engineering at Michigan Tech and today he’s a Marine Project Engineer with Kokosing. He has worked on improvements to the Soo Locks and is now completing a restoration project on North Manitou Island.

Thomas graduated from Michigan State University with a Bachelors in Computer Science. He worked for Thomson Reuters and is now a Software Engineering Specialist with Natonwide, a Fortune 100 financial services and insurance giant in Chicago.

Ellie received a Bachelors in Mechanical Engineering from Michigan State University and went on to complete a Masters in Human Factors Engineering from Northeastern University. A member of the Battlebots team “Bloodsport,” Ellie also travels the world as a Process Engineer with Eli Lilly and Company.

Oh the places our RoboDawgs go!

10/17/2026

We shared the following post privately with our RoboDawg parents - and it generated comments in the first five minutes. We share it now with all our RoboDawg followers. This is a longer post - but it addresses the single most important development shaping the future of our program. Read though this post if you want to see the future that is racing forward RIGHT NOW - and share your comments.

On October 6, 2026, OpenAI published a massive batch of over 700 AI-generated research manuscripts (covering more than 370 distinct mathematical and theoretical computer science problems.) The incredible number of proofs - and the breadth of the fields covered - presented proofs that represent a jump forward in human knowledge that negates hundreds or thousands of man-years of dedicated research and development. It is the strongest evidence yet that we have entered an age where AI capabilities have surpassed what humans are capable of.

“If a human did this, it would be an instant Fields Medal, no questions asked.” That’s how Alex Kontorovich, chair of the department of mathematics at Rutgers, responded to an A.I.-generated proof that OpenAI, the artificial intelligence giant, released on Tuesday.

And that single proof — worthy, in Dr. Kontorovich’s assessment on social media, of arguably the highest honor in the field of mathematics — was just one among more than 350 findings that the firm released that day, all at once.

Terence Tao is one of the world’s greatest living mathematicians

In an interview this week with the New York Times he was asked about the hundreds of proofs released by Open AI

“There are no rules any more,” Dr. Tao, 51, said in an interview before the workshop in his modest office on the U.C.L.A. campus, his home since 1996, when he arrived after completing his doctorate at Princeton at the age of 20.

Tao mourned “the path not taken, and the opportunities lost in the frantic race to develop this technology.”

We are incredibly excited by the opportunity AI presents to our robotics teams, but Tao’s last sentence sums it all up. We have to be careful not to lose the value of taking the path, of developing new knowledge and skills for our students, in the quest to more quickly develop advanced programming to win robotics competitions.

We are already seeing competitors in our educational robotics competitions where the only push is to have AI write more advanced software so they can win at events. Our RoboDawg program is an educational program. We are leaders in deploying AI with our teams - but we will never choose winning over learning. The path matters - not just the outcome.

The Fields Medalist Terence Tao is on the front lines of a debate about artificial intelligence and the future of his field.

10/05/2026

Once again, a big THANK YOU to our donors! You allowed us to complete our project on Donors Choose, and our students have a new 3D Printer on which to make robot parts!! Thank you!!