FIRST Robotics Competition, FIRST LEGO® League and FIRST Tech Challenge

Thousands of Students to Compete in Three Robotics Competitions Under One Roof

Start Time:	Saturday, March 7, 2009 at 9:30am
End Time:	Sunday, March 8, 2009 at 6:00pm
Location:	Jacob Javits Center
Street:	655 West 34th Street
City/Town:	New York, NY

Description

The event is an opportunity for New York City students to showcase their engineering prowess and learn invaluable life and career skills.

“As we face an increasingly-complex global economy, we need to prepare our youth to be innovative problem-solvers,” said FIRST Regional Director Randy Schaeffer. “FIRST provides our students with experience in hands-on engineering challenges, allowing them to hone their skills and prepare for successful futures.”

At the New York City FIRST event, 66 FIRST Robotics Competition teams, 72 FIRST LEGO League teams and 48 FIRST Tech Challenge teams will compete to advance to the FIRST Championship at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta, April 16-18. This is the 9th year of NYC FIRST Robotics Competition, 8th year of NYC FIRST LEGO League and 2nd year of FIRST Tech Challenge.

New York City FIRST Robotics Competition

Saturday, March 7 & Sunday March 8
9:00am to 4:00pm

In January, all high school teams were shown this year's FIRST Robotics Competition game – called “LUNACYTM” – for the first time and received a common kit of parts - but no instructions. Working with mentors, students now had just six weeks to design, build, and test their robots to meet the season's engineering challenge. In LUNACY, students custom-design their robots to pick up dodge ball-sized balls and steer, scoop, shoot or otherwise thrust the balls into trailers on their opponents’ robots to score.

New York City FIRST Tech Challenge Championship
Sunday, March 8
9:30am to 4:00pm
The FIRST Tech Challenge, provides high school students with the same challenge as the FIRST Robotics Competition, but with a more accessible and affordable robotics kit. Students get to test their technological and strategic skills in this year’s challenge – Face Off!

New York City FIRST LEGO League Citywide Championship
Saturday, March 7
9:30am to 4:00pm

The FIRST LEGO League teams students ages 9-14 to build competitive robots out of LEGO components. Every year, FLL works with experts in the field to create a Challenge that relates to a significant real-world issue. The end result is a two-part Challenge that requires research to complete The Project, and science and engineering to master the complex missions of The Robot Game. It’s a fun and exciting way to encourage kids’ minds. This year’s challenge is called Climate Connections. The teams participating at Javits qualified from among 230 middle school teams at qualifying tournaments in the five boroughs

In the 2009 FIRST season, more than 196,000 students are participating in 50 countries on more than 17,000 teams in hundreds of regional competitions around the world and one Championship.

Video and photos are archived at:
FRC - http://www.usfirst.org/community/resourcecenter.aspx?id=648
FTC - http://www.usfirst.org/community/resourcecenter.aspx?id=744
FLL - http://www.usfirst.org/community/resourcecenter.aspx?id=814

ABOUT FIRST
Accomplished inventor Dean Kamen founded FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) in 1989 to inspire an appreciation of science and technology in young people. Based in Manchester, N.H., FIRST designs accessible, innovative programs to build self-confidence, knowledge, and life skills while motivating young people to pursue opportunities in science, technology, and engineering. With the support of many of the world's most well-known companies, the not-for-profit organization hosts the FIRST Robotics Competition and FIRST Tech Challenge for high-school students, the FIRST LEGO® League for children 9-14 years old, and the Junior FIRST LEGO League for 6 to 9 year-olds. To learn more about FIRST, go to www.usfirst.org.

ABOUT NEW YORK CITY/NEW JERSEY FIRST
New York City / New Jersey FIRST is a regional headquarters of the FIRST (For Recognition and Inspiration in Science and Technology) student robotics program and is based at New Jersey Institute of Technology in Newark, New Jersey.

The New York City /New Jersey FIRST regional program is growing, with 105 FIRST Robotics teams, 334 FIRST LEGO League teams and 60 FIRST Tech Challenge teams. We also host a variety of team support activities that foster and support the development of the FIRST Robotics, FIRST Tech Challenge, and FIRST LEGO League teams.

The competitions, tournaments, programs and activities of FIRST in New York City / New Jersey are made possible by the efforts of Planning Committees made up of dedicated volunteers who want to make a difference in kids’ lives. For more information please visit our Web site at http://nycnjfirst.org.