GM engineers lead robotics mentoring in Southwest Detroit

Joaquin Nuno-Whelan’s role as chief engineer for General Motors full-size SUVs keeps him plenty busy. But helping Southwest Detroit high school students build robots and learn engineering could be the best vehicle he will make for his employer.

Over the last four years, Nuno-Whelan has brought dozens of volunteer mentors to the Robotic Engineering Center of Detroit in Corktown. When he started, 48 kids from Cesar Chavez Academy and Cristo Rey high schools made up two FIRST Robotics teams. This year, the center has 11 teams and 173 students. They compete in a powerhouse state for robotics with more than 500 teams.

In Southwest Detroit, where street gangs and fear of Immigration and Customs Enforcement sweeps are part of life, Nuno-Whalen models “downstream recruiting” of future engineering talent.

“The amazing thing is there was already a lot of momentum,” he said of the center housed in the Detroit Hispanic Development Corp. on Trumbull. “The number of mentors we’re able to bring in is just game-changing. We’ve really tapped into the new generation of GM engineers, and they have embraced it.”

In fact, 90 percent of the program’s 72 mentors – about one for every two students -- work for GM.

They taught preseason classes in business management, programming, electrical and pneumatics, and mechanical engineering to 50 students. Kettering University and Michigan Tech hosted 44 students, including 10 from middle school, on their campuses for a week last summer to expose them to college life.

Frank Venegas, chairman and CEO of Ideal Group Inc., started robotics at the DHDC in 2013 with a dozen kids from Cesar Chavez. The next year, he and former GM Chief Technology Officer Tom Stephens recruited Nuno-Whelan after an assignment in Brazil. They had a good reason.

As an engineering group manager for GM de Mexico seven years earlier, Nuno-Whelan started the initial FIRST – For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology – teams in that country. His teams won a rookie team award and qualified to go to the world championship in Atlanta. Mexico today has 60 FIRST teams.

“He is a rock star,” Venegas said of Nuno-Whalen. “When Joaquin brought in the mentors, that was the secret sauce. He just took the program to the next level.”

The 40-year-old Nuno-Whelan, who has also succeeded Venegas as DHDC chairman, looks for potential future hires who stand out in robotics. At the same time, he observes GM mentors for leadership skills that could affect their careers.

“This is has turned into something way bigger than we ever could have imagined,” Nuno-Whelan said. “We’ve grown down to the middle school level and helped (older) kids get scholarships. We’ve hired three of these kids as interns at GM. When we got started, we really didn’t know what we were getting into.”

Nuno-Whalen's wife, Tanya, helps younger students in a FIRST Lego League team at Holy Redeemer grade school. That team already qualified for the world championship at Cobo Center April 25-28.

The world robotics championships will draw 40,000 robotics enthusiasts to Detroit and millions of dollars in economic impact. It's the first time the event is being held in Michigan, which has 508 high school teams this year — the most of any state in the country.

Joaquin Nuno-Whalen spent many winter evenings of the six-week FIRST build season at the robotics center.

“You see him taking off his tie, rolling up his sleeves and working with the rookie teams. He loves to do that,” said Jonathan Rodriguez, RECD coordinator. “I tell the kids to Google Joaquin Nuno-Whelan. They’re dumbfounded to see that he’s a celebrity. That changes them. They see him come in and they’re like straight arrows.”

As word spread and more students got involved, the need grew for help beyond mentors. The Michigan Engineering Zone, a University of Michigan Engineering outreach in Orchestra Place, came alongside the Robotic Engineering Center of Detroit. So did teams from Farmington Hills, Northville and Novi, which shared their experience and their equipment.

“There hasn’t been a time that we’ve needed help that we didn’t get help,” Rodriguez said. “It’s not competition. It’s coopetition.”

Not so much when it comes to recruiting though. Nuno-Whalen said “companies fight over the kids coming out.”

Robotics maker Fanuc America; Aisin World Corp. of America; Magna International; mechanical contractor John E. Green; and Kautex Detroit, a division of Textron, all hunt future talent at the RECD.

As does Venegas. “I get first draft pick,” he says only half joking. “These kids that are now graduating from college are superstars. I get my top senior leaders to put these kids under their wings.”