Mentors and Supervisors
As a team, we deeply thank the people who teach us. EastBots wouldn't succeed as much as we have without those who devote their time to help our student members learn and develop, both as students and as people.
Steve Tell
Steve is a founding mentor of the Eastbots, having been recruited by our original self-motivated students in the fall of 2012 before our rookie season. He has coached robot design, garage machining, power wiring, but especially enjoys teaching about sensors to help students make robots that respond to their environment. For the last several years he has also volunteered as a FIRST robot inspector at local competitions. When not doing FIRST, Steve is a Senior Research Scientist in the Circuits Resarch Group at NVIDIA corporation. He lives in the ECHHS district in Chapel Hill with his wife Rose and dog Marconi.
Bradley Nemitz
I am a math teacher and mentor to the Eastbots at East Chapel Hill High School. I student-taught at ECHHS while studying math and education at UNC Chapel Hill. After graduating, I moved to Richmond, Virginia where I taught for 5 years and met my wife. We moved back to Chapel Hill for her study Public Heath at UNC and I returned to East. We have two dogs, Ash and Maple, who love to sniff and run around our backyard. I am very into board games like Agricola and Power Grid and I try to be out on my mountain bike (and sometimes road bike) as much as possible. I enjoy playing music and play guitar for the East faculty band. I do photography and often take photos for the Eastbots. Though I've done some programming some and can understand what's going on with our programming team, I feel most at home with the mechanical team, as I'm used to working on cars, bikes, and house projects.
Jeff Alguire
Jack of all Trades, Master of Some. I grew up in a small island town in Southeast Alaska. I have been a stage set designer and set builder for many many years, as well as a residential carpenter. I have always been curious about how things work. That includes a desire to tinker and deconstruct things and rebuild them for my own purposes. I will be the first to admit that I am not good at it and still have a lot to learn.
Amalan Iyengar
Hi! I'm an Eastbots class of 2016 Alum and have been mentoring since the 2018-2019 season. I finished my Bachelor's in Computer Science and Master's in Electrical Engineering from NC State and currently work at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab.
Tarun Goyal
My name is Tarun Goyal, but most people call me Toonie. I was on the Eastbots from 2015-2019 and served as the build captain, design lead and drive coach. I am going into my third year as an Eastbots mentor and I focus on the mechanical and design subteams. I’m a senior studying mechanical engineering at Georgia Tech and I’ll be graduating in December 2022. I have worked at Philips creating medical devices and MIT Lincoln Lab on systems engineering. When I’m not doing robotics, I enjoy playing board games, video games, cooking and playing badminton. I also have a dog named Hugo.
Leadership and Officers
One of our team’s core principles is that a student-run leadership model is highly successful in achieving student inspiration and professional development. With this principle in mind, we have continued to iterate on our leadership structure each year. Changes are made by the current leadership group and the team’s mentors just before the annual election in May. Other changes to our organization, such as membership requirements, are made by the leadership group and approved by the team each August when the team handbook is updated. Currently, our leadership is comprised of five student officers, who oversee administrative and non-engineering related programs, and five subteam leads who are responsible for robot construction and developing the team’s technical repertoire. Officers are elected by a ranked-choice vote; subteam leads are appointed by mentors.
Lucien Genova
I am a senior here at East and I am currently the President and Build Captain of the EastBots. I have been on the team since I was a freshmen. In addition to my interest in STEM, I enjoy to play the piano and the harp. I also love to watch movies in my free-time!
Andrea Basuroski
I am a senior here at East and I am currently the president and project manager of the EastBots. I have been on the team since I was a freshman. In addition to my interest in STEM, I enjoy playing piano and visual art. I also love to watch movies in my free time!
Evelyn Steinbeck
I am a junior in my second year on Eastbots and I am serving as the Business Captain and Marketing Lead in the 2022-2023 season.
Srinivas Iyengar
I am a senior at East, and I am the mechanical lead of the Eastbots. As mechanical lead, my primary role is to train new mechanical members in things like manufacturing and assembly. My role is also to keep my subteam organized and to make sure that everyone has a task.
Wesley Li
Hello, I am a sophomore at East and I am currently the design lead of the team. My role in the team is to design robot mechanisms and help new members with design. I'm also a member of the mechanical team. I enjoy the process of designing robots and make it real. Outside FIRST, I am a combat robotics competitor and a drone enthusiast. In my spare time, I love working on useless DIY gadgets purely for fun!
Darya Loiko
Hi! My name is Darya and I am the Electrical Lead here on team 4795. Being a part of the Eastbots has also been an amazing experience in terms of meeting like-minded individuals and sharing our knowledge to grow as both students and humans. My main role on the team is to teach members about the electrical devices we utilize in our projects and to work in conjunction with the other subteams to make our robots come to life! I can't wait to see more of the amazing things we can accomplish together!
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Ryan Huang
Hey! I'm Ryan, I'm currently a sophomore and will be your software lead for the 2022 season! My main role is to train our future programmers and to lead the effort to write software to run on our robots. Also love to help out here and there with mechanical when I get the chance!! While I'm not doing my thing on the team you'll either find me hitting the roads or going off somewhere for some odd race.
Dharma Chari-Letts
Hi! My name is Dharma and I am a Sophomore at East. Currently I am outreach lead and a member of mechanical. My job entails that I get the team involved in the community. My role is to start programs and create volunteer opportunities that inspire robotics and engineering. Outside robotics I love baking and playing tennis!.
