Left Hand Laurel - Tom Wilke

Tom Wilke

Up-a-Creek-Robotics

"A robot is a machine that can perform tasks," explains Tom Wilke, taking a sip of his drink outside at lunch in Niwot's Cottonwood Square. "A self-driving Tesla, for example, is a robot."

Wilke is a retired mechanical engineer and adjunct professor at CU Boulder, who is also a mountain climber and author and chairman of the board of Boulder Meals on Wheels. But what we're talking about this particular day is a huge victory he shared as a mentor to Up-A-Creek-Robotics, a St. Vrain Valley School District robotics team which, this past April in Houston, won the world robotics championship.

"It was fantastic," Wilke exclaimed, recalling the four-day robotics competition in Texas where 120 high school teams from 14 countries competed for the honor. "We were partnered with Romania," he continued. "Thousands of people were there. The competition was live streamed around the world. It was held at the Houston Convention Auditorium with hundreds of people waving their countries' flags. There were two robots on each team. People from all over the world were there."

"It really, really was fantastic," said this month's Left Hand Laurel recipient, breaking into a big smile.

At the beginning of January (a few days after his son's house burned down in the Marshall Fire), it was announced that every robotics team around the world had to construct a robot that could throw tennis balls. Wilke pulled up a video on his phone, leaned over the table where we were dining, and shared a video of the robots his team of high school robotics engineers from the St. Vrain Valley School District had constructed. It led to their winning the Colorado state competition and then the world championship.

"It's just unbelievable," he continued. "There are 6,300 teams world-wide in this First Tech Challenge event. We work with kids in 9th through 12th grade. I started five years ago as one of the mentors. We're a 501(c)3 non-profit called GEAR Alliance, sponsored by St. Vrain Valley School District with a headquarters in Longmont, donated by Terry Olkin, a local entrepreneur and philanthropist.

"These high school kids that we work with are so talented," Wilke continued. "They write software code. They are so competent and tech savvy. When they apply to the club, they have to show interest and aptitude and commitment – that they are willing to meet three days a week – Monday, Wednesday and Sunday. It's a big commitment."

Wlike, who is a spry and energetic 67-year-old father and grand-father, moved to Boulder from Phoenix in 1983. Born on the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, at age 11 – his Dad being transferred to the South -–Wilke moved with his family to a small rural town in Alabama. There were 2,000 people there - half were black and half were white. "I learned a lot," he said. "It was very enlightening. I had never met a black person before. It was 1969. I was in a Baptist school system going through desegregation with very tumultuous protest marches."

He recalled one event, when he was in ninth grade, that was clearly life-changing. "A 19-year-old black woman in our town was hit and killed by a white driver," he said. "Ralph Abernathy, (Martin Luther King's successor) as head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, came to our small Alabama town for her funeral.' Wilke remembers a huge civil rights demonstration where he was one of the only whites who showed up. He was in the ninth grade.

"I remember them wheeling her wooden coffin from the black section of town to the white section of town. It was a silent march – 3,000 black people – to our courthouse in Butler, Alabama. I remember the town shutting down and the hatred. It gave me a good appreciation of the strong hatred people can hold in their hearts."

Clearly, Wilke chose a different path. "Tom is a very dedicated individual," said Niwot attorney Tom Moore, who serves with Wilke on the board of Boulder Meals on Wheels. "And I know how his participation with the robotics team is very, very meaningful to him and to the kids."

Besides his successful career as a mechanical engineer, who "worked for data storage companies in the area, and then got into medical monitoring devices" including development of pulse oximeters and ventilators, Wilke said he started mountain climbing in mid-life. He has climbed "all 58 of the 14ers" and written and published a book called "Climbing is Ageless" about climbing so many of the highest 14,000-foot peaks peaks of the Rockies. Without elaborating, he said his second published book, called "Twigs Legacy of Resilience," is about "dealing with tragedy." It's based on the life story of a childhood friend.

A man of many talents, Wilke is clearly committed to giving back and he is very grateful that his friend Frank Burnett, husband of a local state representative, approached him five years ago to become a mentor of the robotics club. "I love it," he said." it's a big commitment and a lot of fun."