(Colonia, Yap) Island students have been receiving high tech training in the design and construction of robots as the five high schools of the Yap Robo League work towards their goal of a statewide robotics competition next spring.

Habele’s Director of STEM Programs, Amelia Weiss, first met with participating school leaders on Yap in early December. A series of workshops, site visits, and peer-to-peer trainings followed. Administrators, teachers, and select students from Yap High School, Outer Islands High School, Yap Catholic High School, Yap SDA School, and Faith Christian Academy participated throughout.



In addition to the five participating high schools, staff from the Yap State Public Service Corporation (YSPSC) and Pacific Missionary Aviation (PMA) joined each of the training sessions.

These local industry partners are also building robots in preparation for the all Yap State “Robo Day” scheduled from May 22 of 2018. “It’s clear the students and teachers are highly motivated,” observed Weiss between meetings. “They have the drive, the equipment is coming in, and now we are providing the technical support to help them meet their goals”


Stateside, students and teachers at South River High School in Edgewater, Maryland learned about their peers on Yap. The Power Hawks Robotics Club hosted Habele’s President, Scott Leis, who spoke to the team about the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM), Yap State, Micronesian culture and the Compacts of Free Association (COFA), which formally link the Freely Associated States (FAS) to the US.

Leis also answered questions from students about how they could support the students at their partner school – Yap Public High School.

“The students at South River High School were eager to learn all about the Western Pacific,” explained Leis. “Few realized the geographical realities of life on a remote archipelago or that there is a long-standing, formal relationship between the FSM and US”.


On the US West Coast, students of the Eagle Engineering Robotics Club at Chaminade College Preparatory High School packed a dozen boxes of donated robotics parts. These will be sent to Yap Catholic High School, which will distribute the equipment to the five participating schools across Yap State.

This donation compliments scores of supplies that Habele has already sent this year, thanks to a Technical Assistance Program grant from the United States Department of the Interior’s Office of Insular Affairs (OIA).

“We are thrilled to be helping our peers in the Pacific,” said Coach Tommy Smeltzer of Eagle Engineering. Since 2009, we’ve been proud to support the teams of the Yap Robo League through donations and technical support, and it is especially exciting to see the League continue to grow and thrive.”

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Students on Micronesia's famously traditional Island of Stone Money have begun to design and assemble hi-tech programmable robots.

Robotics clubs at five high schools in Yap received VEX Classroom and Competition Mechatronics kits earlier this month, kicking off expansion of the popular Yap Robo League.

Using the raw parts, students will design, build, and code robots to compete in a statewide STEM exhibition and robotics competition in May. Yap’s Robo League was established in 2011 by the US-based nonprofit “Habele,” and is now expanding across that state through a pilot grant award by the Office of Insular Affairs.



“We were inspired by the students from Yap who represented the Federated States of Micronesia this summer at the 2017 FIRST Global Challenge - H2O FLOW! international robotics competition for high school students here in Washington, D.C.,” said OIA Director Nik Pula.  “Through robotics, the Habele Outer Island Education Fund has been promoting the broadening of students’ experience in applying basic Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math skills in a positive, competitive, and hands-on way, and we are pleased to support expansion of this opportunity for more students in Yap,” continued Pula.


Pupils and teachers at Yap Catholic High School have taken the lead as peer mentors, supporting expansion of the Robotics Team at the Yap SDA School and the creation of new robotics clubs at Yap High School, Outer Island High School, and Faith Academy. Their efforts follow community meetings held by Habele in early Fall to gauge interest and develop plans for the league expansion.


“As the newest school on Yap we are thrilled part of this,” said John Malimai, Principal of Faith Christian Academy in Makiy. “The materials and technical training will expand the scope of our science instruction, and working with the other schools through the league helps us integrate and collaborate with other educators on island.”

While students at the five schools have begun tinkering, teachers and administrators are coordinating for a series of technical trainings in late 2017 and early 2018 to best guide their student’s work. The teams’ skills, developed over the coming months, will be showcased in a public five school robotics competition on May 22, 2018.

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