Twenty-one teams from CCISD Elementary Schools competed in this weekend’s FIRST LEGO League Lone Star Robotics Tournament held at the University of Houston. This year’s challenge was Nano Quest, in which students had to design, build and program a robot to accomplish various missions, as well as create a presentation on a current or potential application of nanotechnology.

In the Robot Performance portion of the competition, the approximately 80 teams were divided into four divisions. After seeding rounds, nine of CCISD’s teams made it to the play-off rounds for their divisions. These nine teams were from Armand Bayou, Brookwood, Clear Lake City, Goforth, Greene, North Pointe, Ross, Ward, and Wedgewood Elementary Schools. Brookwood’s team, the Nanobears, won their division’s final and finished in 2nd place for the entire tournament.

CCISD had three teams recognized as Research Finalists: Armand Bayou Elementary School’s team, the Nano Terrapins, Brookwood Elementary School’s team, the Nanobears, and Goforth Elementary School’s team, the Explorers. These teams were three of the top four teams recognized for the quality of their research, innovative solutions and creative presentations that showed an in-depth understanding of the various scientific disciplines and issues involved with this year’s challenge. Goforth’s Explorers took first place, winning the Research Award for the Lone Star FLL Tournament.

CCISD’s FLL teams were recognized with awards:

• Clear Lake City Elementary's Thunderbotz won the Mentorship award and the Teamwork award.
• Wedgewood Elementary's TechnoTimber Wolves won the Volunteer award.
• Armand Bayou Elementary's Nano Terrapins won the Sportsmanship award.
• Bay Elementary's Bay Boom was recognized as a Finalist in Robot Design.
• Brookwood Nanobears received the second place Champion's Award as the second best team in the tournament for all aspects of the competition (research project, robot performance, and technical design).
• Ross Elementary's Ross Rumblers received a Judges Award.

In addition to the 21 elementary schools participating, the Robonauts, CCISD’s high school robotics team, volunteered at the tournament and ran the field portion of the competition. Prior to the tournament, the Robonauts served as mentors to the CCISD FIRST LEGO League teams.

More information on the 2006 Lone Star FLL Tournament and FIRST LEGO League can be found at:

http://www.usfirst.org/jrobtcs/flego.htm
http://core.tech.uh.edu/
http://www.houstonrobotics.org/