POWAY TEEN RECOGNIZED AS ROBOTICS LEADER
Rohan Bosworth, a Poway High School student who just finished his junior year, was named one of the top FIRST Dean’s List Award winners at the FIRST Robotics World Championship in Houston.
The Poway High Engineering Academy student was one of only 10 students selected out of the thousands of students who participate in the FIRST Tech Challenge.
Rohan has been a longtime participant in the FIRST program, serving as lead programmer on Poway High’s FIRST Robotics Competition Team Spyder and as captain and lead programmer of FIRST Tech Challenge robotics team, Mechanical Advantage.
According to the FIRST website, Dean’s List Winners like Rohan “are great examples of student leaders who have led their Teams and communities to increased awareness for FIRST and its mission. These students have also achieved personal technical
expertise and accomplishment.”
The Dean’s List Award is the most prestigious achievement for an individual in the FIRST program.
Rohan received the award because of his leadership in the FIRST program, academic excellence, technical skill and dedication to community service, organizers said.
He has developed a variety of complex programs and algorithms for robots, including a novel control algorithm for autonomous vehicles, for which he received a first in category award from the U.S. Air Force at the International Science and Engineering Fair in Atlanta.
Rohan said he uses his passion for robotics to provide meaningful STEM opportunities for others. For the last two years, he has worked with his robotics team to form and run a weekly after-school robotics program for underprivileged youths in San Diego County.
During the pandemic, Rohan developed, and with his robotics team, helped teach an innovative computer-aided design program to over 500 local schoolchildren, including a program that allowed them to design holiday ornaments over Zoom. Ornaments were printed on the team’s 3D printers and delivered to the schoolchildren before winter break.
He also founded and now runs the Poway High Computer Science Club and Math Club in addition to being selected as one of four students from Poway High to sit on the Poway Unified Superintendent’s Student Advisory Council. He is also the newly elected president of the Poway High School National Honor Society.