Studying at West Virginia University, you are among winners. In 2023, its robotics team were crowned world champions at the University Rover Challenge. In 2016, they won the first ever NASA Sample Challenge, winning over US$750,000 – the largest prize awarded by the US government agency at that time. In fact, WVU robotic teams have secured nine first-place victories in multiple high-profile national and international robotics competitions over the years.
To Connor Mann, CEO of the University Rover Challenge team, traveling to these competitions is “the best experience” of his WVU education. But what he gets to do at the Benjamin M. Statler College of Engineering and Mineral Resources is just as exciting.
“My favourite academic experience in the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering programme was the designing and building of a glider in the Intro to Aerospace Engineering course with Dr. Christopher D. Griffin,” he says. “Although our glider was tragically destroyed in a wind storm the night before the competition, we were able to pull together and construct a new glider and got it to fly.”
Mann has taken part in the Applications Engineering Co-op at Altec Inc and interned as an Undergraduate Research Assistant for the WVU Interactive Robotics Laboratory as well. “I would like to work on bringing robotics into more dynamic, real-world environments in order to solve many of the challenges facing humanity,” he says.
At Statler College, students like Mann are learning about and creating solutions to revolutionise industrial settings, transporting people safely, developing AI-driven control to navigate different terrains and environments and exploring distant planets. Mann is technically a Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering student but has benefited from the college’s many experiential learning opportunities related to this field.
Today, a new well-designed degree programme serves as a more direct launchpad to dream jobs in Robotics Engineering, listed as one of the fastest-growing professions globally, according to the recent World Economic Forum Future of Jobs Report.
“I think what gets me excited about robotics is that there are a lot of possibilities where robots have the potential to go anywhere that humans can and even beyond that. You can now have robots going out and doing search and rescue tasks or scanning forests and things like that,” PhD student Clarus Goldsmith says. “So, there’s a lot of interesting problems to solve in order to get robots to do those things.”
WVU’s four-year Robotics Engineering degree programme explores mechanical systems, computer science, and engineering systems to provide you with a strong interdisciplinary foundation. By mastering the fundamentals of robotics systems, mobile robotics, robotic manipulators and autonomy, you’ll gain the knowledge and skills to develop your own robotics solutions.
There are three strategic focus areas: Mobile Robotics, Robotic Manipulators, and Robot Autonomy. Whichever you choose, you’ll be well-prepared for the final yearlong capstone project, designed to set you up for your next role, whether it’s in industry, government, or academia.
In robotics engineering, there is a wealth of experiential learning opportunities such as competition teams. Pictured above is Connor Mann testing the University Rover Challenge robot. Source: West Virginia University
Competitions: The best experiential learning opportunity
Alongside the capstone project, there are many opportunities to learn by doing here, the most effective of which is to join competitions.
Held annually in the desert of southern Utah, the University Rover Challenge is the world’s premier robotics competition where student teams design and build the next generation of Mars rovers that will one day work alongside astronauts exploring the Red Planet. WVU’s reigning champions Team Mountaineers placed second in the 2024 University Rover Challenge finals, the latest in a decade-long stride as an international leader in robotic competitions.
“The students who travelled to Utah for the final competition are leaders in their respective areas, showcasing remarkable technical skills, teamwork and sound judgment under extreme pressure,” says mechanical, materials and aerospace engineering professor and faculty advisor Yu Gu.
WVU’s University Rover Challenge team lets you work together with students from different fields to design, build, and test the rover. Depending on which sub-team you are assigned to (algorithms, drivetrain, electronics, green, management, manipulation, programming, or science), you will gain not only practical know-how but also soft skills like teamwork, communication, and leadership.
The F1Tenth team builds a 1/10th-scale autonomous race car and competes internationally. Just last year and their first time competing, the university’s F1Tenth team placed second against teams from Canada and China at the 2024 Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) International Conference on Smart Mobility. According to the Lane Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering assistant professor and faculty advisor Amr El-Wakeel, the F1Tenth race offers undergraduate or graduate students an excellent opportunity to bridge the gap between theory and practical application through experiential learning — gaining foundational knowledge in perception, path planning, control and artificial intelligence.
Meanwhile, the VEX Robotics team puts the the coding and engineering skills of WVU students to the test. Though this team placed third in the regional competition, they qualified for the VEX Robotics World Championship Tournament that will be held in May 2025. At the 2023 VEX World Competition, they ranked 13th in their division globally.
Robotics Engineering at the Benjamin M. Statler College of Engineering and Mineral Resources sets students up for success at the likes of SpaceX, Tesla, Carnegie Robotics, Honeybee Robotics, and more. Stephen Jacobs (holding world champion trophy) was immediately recruited by SpaceX after this competition. Source: West Virginia University
Riveting research, successful graduates
As a WVU student, and even at the undergraduate level, you have many pathways to work in cutting-edge research with robotics, including developing a robotic pollination robot, designing planetary rovers and systems, mapping underground mines, servicing satellites and modelling the nervous systems of insects.
“My research focuses on biologically inspired robotics, which is the idea that animals are able to accomplish a whole variety of complex behaviours really well that robots currently struggle with,” says Goldsmith, a fifth year PhD candidate working in the Neuro-Mechanical Intelligence Laboratory. “So our idea is that if we investigate how animal nervous systems and bodies accomplish these tasks, we can apply that to robots, and then it’ll hopefully give robots the same kind of capabilities.”
Academia is by no means the only option available to WVU Robotics Engineering students to get to the forefront of innovation.
Goldsmith investigating animal nervous systems and applying to robots in the Neuro-Mechanical Intelligence Laboratory. Source: West Virginia University
You’re set to apply to a wide range of roles at some of the most impactful companies in the US and beyond too. These include SpaceX, Tesla, General Electric, General Motors, John Deere, Amazon, Northrup Grumman, Applied Physics Laboratory, Aurora Flight Sciences, Carnegie Robotics, Honeybee Robotics, Agility Robotics, Near Earth Autonomy, L5 Automation, and many more.
Create the future in a rapidly evolving world – apply to Robotics Engineering at West Virginia University today.
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