HUNTSVILLE, Alabama — The Rocket City Regional - Alabama’s annual FIRST Robotics Competition - will be held Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, April 6-8 at the Von Braun Center South Hall in Huntsville, Alabama. This event is free and open to the media, public, and children.
FIRST Robotics is a global robotics competition for students in grades 9-12. Teams are challenged to raise funds, design a team brand, hone teamwork skills, and build and program industrial-sized robots to play a difficult field game against competitors.
NASA and its Robotics Alliance Project provide grants for high school teams and support for FIRST Robotics Competition to address the critical national shortage of students pursuing STEM careers. This FIRST Robotics Competition is supported by NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and NASA’s Office of STEM Engagement.
District and regional competitions - such as the Rocket City Regional - are held across the country during March and April, providing teams a chance to qualify for the 2023 FIRST Robotics Competition Championship events held in late April in Houston.
More than 1,000 high school students on 50 teams from 15 states, Mexico, and Brazil will compete in a new robotics game called "CHARGED UP."
Opening ceremonies begin at 8:30 a.m. CDT on Friday and Saturday only, with qualification matches underway at 9 a.m. each day. The Friday awards ceremony will begin at 6 p.m., while the Saturday awards ceremony will begin at 2:30 p.m.
Every match at FIRST Robotics competition is two and a half minutes. Ohio student ambassador Lorelei Choate said, "right now, in our pit, our robot's getting ready for the match. It's currently going through a checklist. I know I've made the checklist where we run through, make sure we have everything we need in order to be prepared from changing batteries to bumper colors," Choate stated.
Alex Solis is here from Mexico to tell us all about their robot for this year's "Charged Up" competition. "This robot, which is a serve drive, it has an arm which can lift both cubes and cones in any level of the roles," said Solis.
FIRST Robotics competition senior program manager Dana Hobbs said the students were given a problem. "Which their problem was how to build a robot to compete with this game. and of course, the solution is to get the most points and be the winners that from here will advance on to the world championship in Houston in just two weeks," Hobbs explained. This is their last chance to try to make it to the championship, and Hobbs said the most important thing is that they are developing our future workforce.
Limestone County student ambassador Whitby Collins said this is a huge opportunity for him. "It's able to launch your career and it looks really good on resumes and that sort of thing. So, for any students who are out there, I would suggest find a first team near you for the huge experience," Whitby said.