Mentoring and Upshots from the AWS DeepRacer League Event
A blog of pride that captures my remarkable and first-time mentorship during the March 2022 event at KGISL Institute of Technology.
After the end of the Deepracer Physical track launch on December 5, 2021, the team began to commence the process to execute the AWS DeepRacer League in March’22. The whole team became busy, occupied, and engaged in doing various work.
There were around 50 days to complete the registrations. Initially, around 20 Coordinators were appointed to guide the registered students and developers. Each member was given around 30 members to deal with. We received around 500+ registrations.
After successfully registering, all the participants were given a course to complete which deals with the fundamentals of Artificial Intelligence and machine learning. Sequentially, they were given AWS Credentials to train and evaluate their models.
After completing the course the participants were directed to attend the webinar series to get insights into the whole technical process. Followed by those there were model submissions and a test in physical track.
Since the DeepRacer platform was very much familiar to me, I was instructed not to participate in the event. But, I was told to mentor the participants from diverse places. I had many phone calls to make them clear to continue in the league. One technical month passed very soon. At last, there were around 150 students who completed all the steps with perfection.
These 150 students were split and mapped to another coordinator again. Most of the students charted to me were my classmates and seniors, so it was a cup of tea to instruct them. I made sure that everyone gets the message delivered by creating a group for them.
I frequently arranged virtual meetings to get their queries and problems in the console solved. There were 4 participants given to me from other colleges. I made all the processes clear for them and eased their participation. All the three webinars organized by the team were so useful and I am sure they helped every participant who attended them.
By the way, I was also hustling to create the best models than my older ones, believing it could lend me hands to continue my mentorship even better. I referred to many GitHub repositories and visited many Youtube channels to gain more knowledge to solve issues and set them free. Personally, I witnessed my level of understanding and implementing things was enhanced for a better outcome.
As the League came nearby, A virtual race was created to select the topmost models with fewer off-tracks and fast lap time. Simultaneously, I was given an opportunity to present an overview of AWS DeepRacer to higher secondary school students. I prepared informative presentation slides. A demo session with Deepracer Physical car was planned.
I was very happy that 4/8 of my team members’ models were shortlisted for the finals (Top 20). I was really happy that participants who were mentored by me were able to make it to the finale. The stupendous finals arrived and I was busy volunteering and coordinating the event. I was amazed by the talk of all the chief guests. The semi-finals began and few models performed well as in the simulation.
Mr.Vishram Thatte, Mr. Darshan, Mr.Madhukiran, all were so enthusiastic during the finals and added more fun to the event. All the top 20 models were executed on the track and Kousi Priya C, Anjana Sree, (from KiTE), and Sheik Anzil (from Nilgiris CAS) remained on the leaderboard and were at the top.
After all the models were evaluated, the DeepRacer car itself seemed quite exhausted with taking decisions! The time to announce the winners had come. With a funny countdown, Kousipriya C from KiTE was announced as the winner. Madanabala from Sri Krishna College of Engineering, Coimbatore was the runner-up. I felt proud of myself as one of my mentees was the winner!
This league really tested my teaching, event-organizing, and coordinating skills. Overall it was great to work and share technical knowledge. From all these key takeaways I am now planning to apply for Deep Learning Nanodegree programs. I am also currently enrolled in the AWS AI&ML scholarship program in which knowing DeepRacer is the criteria to get in.
One more feather on my cap! I was presented with this shield for my contributions to the event!
I am always grateful to Ashok Bakthavathsalam and the whole college management for giving me an opportunity to Learn by Doing. I take pride that the institution I am associated with has the physical track and the DeepRacer car available for anyone interest to come and visit and get inspired by it!
