14 teams from Mexico’s PrepaTec high school have moved on to the international FIRST Robotics Competition finals , where they will join the Mexican delegation at the event taking place on 17 to 20 April in Houston, Texas .
The FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) is an international high school robotics competition. Each year, teams of high school students, coaches, and mentors work during a six-week period to build game-playing robots that weigh up to 125 pounds (57 kg).
Robots complete tasks such as scoring balls into goals, flying discs into goals, inner tubes onto racks, hanging on bars, and balancing robots on balance beams.
The game, along with the required set of tasks, changes annually. While teams are given a standard set of parts, they are also allowed a budget and are encouraged to buy or make specialized parts.
Through the FIRST competition, PrepaTec seeks to involve it students in a high-level international initiative so that they learn to develop professional skills such as self-management, teamwork, communication, creativity, innovation, both personal and social responsibility, and critical thinking.
A total of 94,750 students from 33 countries have participated in this year’s edition, out of which 76 are Mexican and 31 are from PrepaTec .
In the framework of the 50th anniversary of the Moon landing , this year, the mission will be called “ Destination: Deep Space .” The participants’ robots will have to place balls and disks representing planetary samples on certain objectives and ships within the planet PRIMUS. Both in the regional leagues and the final competition, the winners will be those who are able to reach the highest score in 2.5 minutes’ time, though other factors, such as fair play and the robot design, will also be taken into account.
In the second part of the competition, the teams will have to negotiate with other contestants to build alliances so that the teams may help each other win the competition.
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