Photograph courtesy of The Crown Publishing Group
It was minor news to many when Segway inventor Dean Kamen announced that the FIRST Robotics Competition’s national championship would be held in St. Louis from 2011 through 2013, with the first championship coming here next month. But to a certain crowd, it was like NFL commissioner Roger Goodell announcing the Edward Jones Dome would host the Super Bowl for the next three years. Seem like a stretch? Ask bestselling author Neal Bascomb. The St. Louis native’s latest book, The New Cool, documents the dramatic journey of Dos Pueblos High School physics teacher/MacArthur Fellow Amir Abo-Shaeer and his 31 seniors as they scramble to build a robot that can compete against 347 teams at the FIRST Championship—as 12,000 screaming fans look on.
When you attended Parkway West High School, did it have anything like this?
We had science fairs and the like... I was good at math and science, and I liked programming—but one of the reasons I wrote the book is that I got a lot of pressure to steer myself out of that because it was “dorky” and “not cool.” So I went the opposite direction, which was to become a writer. I don’t regret it at all, but you always wonder, “What if?”
Of all book topics, what made you choose a high-school robotics competition?
My nephew, who was in New Jersey. He was in high school, going through this awkward time, and he didn’t really have a place for himself until he got involved in a FIRST robotics team. In many ways, it changed his life… I thought I was just going to write a magazine article on it and went up to Manchester, [N.H.], for the kickoff, and I was just blown away by the enthusiasm that everyone had, how big and exciting and real it was.
What was your impression?
Two things: The first is, I was amazed at how much smarter kids are than I was in school; I did really well in school, but I was nowhere near this smart. [Laughs.] The second thing is that it was almost like watching myself in everything that I learned while playing hockey in high school. I think robotics is no different than that—but it just focuses on something that these kids will actually be able to use.
You labeled the book The New Cool. Has the perception of math and science changed since you were a kid?
Woodie Flowers, the co-founder of FIRST and a professor at MIT, makes a point that you get what you celebrate—what the culture is focusing on. If it’s how much people are making on Wall Street or who’s playing on my iPod, then that’s what people aim to be. Over the past decade, there’s been a lot of focus on Google and Facebook, where technology is becoming something exciting on the media level. Maybe it’s steering back, but there’s a long way to go.
The book’s being adapted into a movie by producer Scott Rudin (of The Social Network and True Grit) and Disney. Do you think it will be something like the hockey movie Miracle, except with robots?
Right—or maybe what School of Rock did for rock bands in high school, this will do for robotics teams.
Did you have any sway in the championships’ coming to St. Louis?
No, but it is fortuitous. I’ll at least have a place to stay.
