By Maggie Downs
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Eighth-graders Stephen Fleming (from left), Adam Schworer and Andrew Morrison watch their fully autonomous robot, Free Willie, perform a task in Stephen's basement. (Patrick Reddy photo) | ZOOM |

CRESCENT SPRINGS - You could call them The Little Team that Could.

But they prefer The Young Einsteins.

The team of three junior high boys from Crescent Springs battled the odds to emerge in the top five - out of nearly 2,500 teams - during a national robotics tournament April 11 and 12.

First Lego League International is a program for students age 9-14 that combines a hands-on robotics program with a sports-like competition. Teams of up to 10 have eight weeks to design, build, program, test and refine a fully autonomous robot capable of completing a variety of tasks.

While many teams are sponsored by schools or backed by corporations, the three Young Einsteins just have the full support of their parents and friends.

Fueled by Doritos and soda, they practice in the Crescent Springs basement of coach Mary Kay Fleming, who is the mother of a team member. Most of their funding comes from one student's father, Phil Schworer. Their team mentor - Joseph Haupt, who helps with engineering and design - is a friend from the students' church, St. Joseph Church in Crescent Springs.

This is the second year the group has participated.

"This is really magical to me, because they have a coach who doesn't know anything," Fleming said. "I mean, I'm a psychologist."

For the competition, every team receives the same playing field: an 8-foot-by-4-foot mat. In this case, it was made to look like a cityscape.

Then out of a pile of about 1,500 Legos, a computer chip, light sensors, wheels and other materials, team members design and develop a robot to solve specific missions - like remove "rocks" from a soccer field, stack "houses" in a certain area and remove "food" loops from trees. They also must design computer programs for these specific tasks.

The robot must finish about 10 of these tasks using just five computer programs - all in two and a half minutes.

"We'd done a little bit of programming before, but it wasn't anything like this," said St. Joseph's School student Stephen Fleming, 14, of himself and his science-loving friends. "Once you figure out the basic stuff, you kind of learn on your own from there."

The boys have devoted countless hours to practice, what they call a "labor of love." Soccer practices were skipped. The last school dance was missed. The class trip was not taken.

"It's worth it," said Adam Schworer, 14, of St. Joseph's School. "You learn a lot, but you think you're not learning because you're having too much fun."

This fun comes at a price. The approximate cost for a new team (including the registration fee and all required materials) is more than $600; about $250 for returning teams. That doesn't include the fees to participate in events and competitions.

But competitions are where the boys excel.

The team took home sixth place in the performance category, third place in teamwork and second place in research.

"Somehow, it's all worth it," said Andrew Morrison, 13, a Covington Latin School student, shrugging his shoulders. "Plus, we're all closer as friends now."

E-mail mdowns@enquirer.com