I read a great video blog by Wall Street Journal — Andy Jordan reports on the robot-building tournament. See the final competition below or at WSJ site: Video

For a complete listing of awards, match results and scholarship winners, please visit FIRST online at www.usfirst.org and click on the “FIRST Championship 08” headline.

ATLANTA – April 19, 2008 – Three teams from St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada, Greenville, Texas, and Sterling Heights, Michigan emerged victorious at the FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) Championship at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta this weekend, as one winning alliance. It was the climax to months of competition involving more than 1,500 teams from the United States and seven other nations: Brazil, Canada, Chile, Israel, Mexico, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom.

FIRST Robotics Competition Championship:
• Engineering Inspiration Award – Team 359, “Hawaiian Kids”, Hawaii
• Championship Finalists – Team 16, “Bomb Squad”, Arkansas; Team 67, “The H.O.T. Team”, Michigan; Team 348, “Norwell Robotics”, Massachusetts
• Division Champions – Archimedes Division: Team 177, “Bobcat Robotics”, Connecticut; Team 1024, “Kil-A-Bytes”, Indiana; Team 1124, “?berBots”, Connecticut. Curie Division: Team 16, “Bomb Squad”, Arkansas; Team 67, “The H.O.T. Team”, Michigan; Team 348, “Norwell Robotics”, Massachusetts. Galileo Division: Team 148, “Robowranglers”, Texas; Team 217, “ThunderChickens”, Michigan; Team 1114, “Simbotics”, Ontario, Canada. Newton Division: Team 60, “Bionic Bulldogs”, Arizona; Team 233, “The Pink Team”, Florida; Team 968, “RAWC (Robotics Alliance of West Covina)”, California
• Division Finalists – Archimedes Division: Team 365, “Miracle Workerz”, Delaware; Team 842, “Falcon Robotics”, Arizona; Team 987, “HIGHROLLERS”, Nevada. Curie Division: Team 100, “The WildHats”, California; Team 368, “TKM.368 (Team Kika Mana), Hawaii; Team 2171, “Robo Dogs”, Indiana. Galileo Division: Team 254, “Cheesy Poofs”, California; Team 384, “Sparky 384”, Virginia; Team 1717, “D’Penguineers”, California. Newton Division: Team 141, “WO-BOT”, Michigan; Team 1574, “MisCar”, Israel; Team 2016, “Mighty Monkey Wrenches”, New Jersey
• Autodesk Visualization Award – Team 867, “Absolute Value”, California
• Autodesk Inventor Award – Team 234, “Cyber Blue”, Indiana
• Chrysler Team Spirit Award – Team 1266, “The Devil Duckies”, California
• Delphi “Driving Tomorrow’s Technology”TM Award – Team 1690, “The Answer”, Israel
• General Motors Industrial Design Award – Team 233, “The Pink Team”, Florida
• Johnson & Johnson Gracious Professionalism Award – Team 75, “RoboRaiders”, New Jersey
• Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers Entrepreneurship Award – Team 341, “Miss Daisy”, Pennsylvania
• Motorola Quality Award – Team 27, “Team RUSH”, Michigan
• Rockwell Automation Innovation in Control Award – Team 1024, “Kil-A-Bytes”, Indiana
• Underwriters Laboratories Industrial Safety Award – Team 2062, “C.O.R.E. 2062”, Wisconsin
• XEROX Creativity Award – Team 1771, “404 The Unknown Error”, Georgia
• Imagery Award – Team 365, “Miracle Workerz”, Delaware
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• Rookie All-Star Award – Team 2352, “Metal Mayhem”, Oklahoma
• Rookie Inspiration Award – Team 2599, “Full Throttle”, California
• Highest Rookie Seed Award – Team 2337, “EngiNERDs”, Michigan
• Website Award – Team 115, “MVRT”, California
• Judges’ Awards – For Engineering in Society: Team 922, “ULTIMATE”, Texas; For International Achievement and Environmental Sustainability: Team 1860, “CEPHAS”, Brazil; For Leading Significant Transformation and Cultural Change: Team 768, “TechnoWarriors”, Maryland

FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) helps high-school-aged young people discover how interesting and rewarding the life of engineers and researchers can be. See details @ http://www.usfirst.org/: Dates: 4/4/2008 – 4/6/2008 View the 64 teams registered for this event
Event Website

Bill Gates recently posted an interesting question: How to encourage young people to pursue careers in science and technology?
I believe that we can start by having the cartoons that little kids watch on TV portray engineers and scientists as heroes rather than villains and nerds as it’s done.  There’s a disconnect between media and reality regarding people in my profession.