FIRST Robotics kicks off 2015 season on Jan. 3

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A. Sue Weisler

Last year’s FIRST Robotics competition game, Aerial Assist, consisted of robots scoring team points by tossing medicine balls into different level goals. Regional teams will learn of this year’s game at the 2015 FIRST Robotics Kick Off event on Jan. 3.

FIRST Robotics’ new competition game and kit-of-parts will be the last present unwrapped this holiday season.

This year’s game will be announced at the national FIRST Robotics Kick-Off event at 10:30 a.m. Saturday, Jan. 3, in Kodak Center for Performing Arts, 200 W. Ridge Road, Rochester, N.Y., during a live, worldwide telecast that will include FIRST founder Dean Kamen along with a group of supporters from industry, academia, government and entertainment.

The group will describe the new game and its unique design challenges to the more than 2,800 national and international teams, including 35 from the Rochester/Upstate New York Region.

Teams receive the robot kits and equipment for the new season at the kickoff and will be able to see a demonstration set-up of the competition field in preparation for the regional event. Teams will have six weeks to build robots for the Finger Lakes regional competition March 26–28 at the Gordon Field House and Activities Center at Rochester Institute of Technology.

“Our regional event provides a great opportunity to see the student teams competing and cooperating with each other. Forty-eight teams will attend from around New York as well as Canada,” said Glen Pearson, regional director. “The focus is on making every team succeed with the hope that they can move on to the World Championship in St Louis. You have to be there to appreciate the hard work, innovation, enthusiasm and energy the teams display.”

FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology), sometimes referred to as a “Sport for the Mind,” began in 1989 to spark interest in science through solving engineering problems in a friendly, yet intense competition. Winners from regional competitions across the country will participate in the national event April 22–25 in St. Louis. Teams such as Churchville Chili High School and Wilson Magnet High School from the Finger Lakes Regional have gone on to compete successfully at the national finals.

Both the kickoff on Jan. 3 and the regional event in March are free and open to the public, Pearson added. More information about the Finger Lakes Region FIRST Competition can be found at the FIRST Robotics website.