Last month, inventor Dean Kamen commenced the 2013 FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) season with the kickoff of a new game called Ultimate Ascent. Nearly 51,000 high-school students in 81 cities around the world joined the 2013 kickoff event via live NASA-TV broadcast and Webcast.
“There is no stimulus package that will have as much return as stimulating a bunch of kids to become the workforce of the future, the problem solvers, the creators of the future,” says Kamen.
The 2013 game will be played between two alliances of three teams each. Each alliance competes by trying to score as many Œ ying discs into their goals as possible during a short match. Discs scored in higher goals score more points. The match ends with student-designed robots trying to climb up pyramids located near the middle of the Ž field. FRC teams receive a parts kit of motors, batteries, a control system, PC, and a mix of automation components — with no instructions. Working with mentors, students have six weeks to design, build, program, and test their robots to meet the season’s engineering challenge. Teams then participate in regional and district competitions. For more information, visit us first.org.