Chris Pinkenberg, the coach of the Rocky Point FLL team “Gear Headz,” was named 2015 Person of the Year by Times Beacon Record (TBR) Newspapers. TBR reporter Rachel Silford writes:

Chris Pinkenburg has been trying to get Rocky Point students more interested in math and science. So he created his own robotics club called GearHeadz to do so. Because of this, he has been named a 2015 Times Beacon Record Newspapers Person of the Year.

Pinkenburg, a physicist at Brookhaven National Laboratory, was inspired to create his own robotics club in the Rocky Point school district after attending an educational symposium at BNL. He thought this was the perfect way to get more students involved in engineering. GearHeadz is a privately run FIRST LEGO League team from Rocky Point.

“For years, he was the one who was very vocal about how having robotics in the school is important,” said Bea Ruberto, president of the Sound Beach Civic Association. “Encouraging science and technology is very important for kids.”

Pinkenburg has three children in the Rocky Point school district, all of whom have participated in his robotics club at one point.

“He is very passionate about education,” Wlodek Guryn, Pinkenburg’s colleague at BNL, said. “He wants children to learn as much as possible in school and give them as many opportunities as possible, which is also why he got involved in the robotics club.”

Read more here.