Ralph Lowd
Team Mentor
Ralph Lowd earned his degree in electrical Engineering at MIT. He has had a programming career at IBM testing disk drives. He got involved with machining while working at a machine shop during the summers at MIT which paid for his tuition and by taking classes at De Anza. He first got involved with FIRST in 2001 with Homestead Robotics, where his son was a member. In 2010, he joined as mentor for the Lynbrook Robotics. Currently, he is mostly involved with machining.
Payton Wong
Team Mentor, Canada Pacific Regional 2019 Woodie Flowers Finalist Award
Payton was a machinist for over 25 years and his experience base includes machining components for: R&D, prototypes, fixtures, tooling, thermoform molds, injection molds, robotics, and short runs in the medical device, aerospace, defense and tech industries. He has programmed, set up, and run CNC mills, manual mills and lathes. Payton joined the Funky Monkeys in 2004, and has continued mentoring students in the machine shop. He believes one of the most important things to pass on is teaching others how to "fish"!
David Giandomenico
Team Coach
David Giandomenico earned his Ph.D and M.S. in Electrical Engineering from UC Berkeley, specializing in high voltage and power semiconductor devices, with a minor in numerical analysis. He received his bachelor degree in Electrical Engineering at MIT, with a concentration in literature. Prior to college, Mr Giandomenico attended the Don Bosco Technical Institute in Rosemead CA, where he studied electronics in a four-year technical program.
Yang Xie
Team Mentor, Silicon Valley Regional 2007 Woodie Flowers Finalist Award
Mr. Xie has been a mentor on the Funky Monkeys since the team's founding in 2002. He holds a Ph.D in Mechanical Engineering. He started this club along with his daughter in his garage. Mr. Xie's enormous contributions as a mentor were recognized in 2007 with the prestigious Woodie Flowers Award at the Silicon Valley Regional. He is primarily involved in designing the robot and guiding students through creating strategies.