Tech Hosts 20th Annual FIRST LEGO League

Tennessee Tech will host the 20th annual FIRST LEGO League Saturday.

Tournament Director Kristine Craven said children aging 8 to 15 will participate in creating robots out of LEGOS.

“There’s a robot game and there’s a research project, and a lot of core value emphasis that is all sponsored by FIRST. The students build robots to complete missions, they’re autonomous robots. They do a presentation to judges and then they get judged on things like teamwork and cooperation,” Craven said.

Craven said two Cookeville teams will participate in the competition, the Algood Techies and Lego Lords.

The League will take place in Memorial Gym Saturday morning at 9:00. Craven said the event is free to the public except the research project.

“This year our theme is City Shaper and it’s kind of in the Star Wars hint with the idea of what life might look like and what our cities might look like in the future. So the robot has two and a half minutes to complete as many of the 15 missions as they can,” Craven said.

Craven said 48 teams from the eastern state line to Nashville will compete in the tournament.

FIRST is an organization promoting children’s education in science, robotics, and technology.