The Academic City team continues to encourage and support students to explore and follow their passions and creativities, a brilliant example of which is demonstrated by our last month’s student spotlight – Benedict Amoako – a 1st year engineering student who is passionate about using robotics to drive social change.
Here’s Benedict’s story:
For Benedict Amoako, the unimaginable opportunities in the field of robotics keep him awake at night. He was introduced to the concept of robotics while in Junior High School, which led him to join the Robotics Club in high school (the prestigious Presbyterian Boys Senior High School, Ghana).
In 2016, Benedict and his high school peers participated in the national edition of the World Robofest Championship and were tasked with designing a robot using LEGOs to play golf. His team emerged 3rd in the national competition and was fortunate to represent the country and the entire continent at the international competition.
“During this competition, I imagined the real-life implications that this could have, and it made me realize that my passion was indeed robotics because it was a tool that I could use to effect a positive change in society” said Benedict.
Though the team did not win at the international level, Benedict used this as motivation to coach and train his juniors (the following year), who went onto winning the national edition of the competition.
He has since served as a national judge for the First LEGO League Ghana competition, and a national coach for the First Global Challenge and the Pan-African Robotics Competition and uses these platforms to encourage young people to appreciate the lessons that come from partaking in such competitions, beyond just solely being fixated on winning.
At Academic City, Benedict continues to pursue his robotics passion, while being founder and president of the Academic City Robotics Club, with a goal to drive projects that solve real problems in the community. Currently, the Club is working to develop autonomous ground vehicles that can sense and avoid obstacles, so as to put an end to the recent spate of road accidents in the country. The Club is preparing to organize an internal competition in March 2019.
Benedict dreams of pursuing a PhD in robotics or mechatronics and establishing his own advanced robotics lab in Ghana to solve local challenges, including combatting and possibly eradicating disease outbreaks. “I have struggled with encouraging myself to keep moving forward and I believe that being at Academic City has exposed me to an environment that gives me the opportunity to gain the skills and also pushes me to develop my ideas with people who share similar goals as me” Benedict said.
We look forward to Benedict achieving his dreams, and await his exciting robotics solutions to make our lives easier, every day.
