FIRST LEGO Tournament Recognizes Youth Achiecements
Twelve teams of area youth ages nine to fourteen competed in the FIRST LEGO League Regional Tournament hosted by Ashland Community and Technical College on December 7.
This years competition topic was Natures Fury.First Lego Teams were challenged to come up with innovative solutions to help deal with the effects of natural disasters such as storms, floods and earthquakes. In addition to robot design and performance, the tournament included competitions on project presentation and core values.
Awards went to the following teams and their host schools.
Innovation Awards: Natures Fury Avengers and Rescue Force, both from Holy Family School in Ashland.
Core Values: 1st Catlettsburg Creators from Catlettsburg Elementary School, 2nd Lego Raiders from Greenup County 4H, 3rd TechnoKats from Boyd County Middle School.
Best Project: 1st Lego Barbarians from Greenup County 4H, 2nd Ashland Fury Fighters from Charles Russell Elementary and Verity Middle School, 3rd Access-O-Bots from Boyd County fifth grade Gifted Program.
Robot Design: 1st Lego Rams from Raceland Middle School, 2nd Access-O-Bots, 3rd Robo Fire Cats from Boyd County Middle School.
Robot Performance: 1st Lego Raiders, 2nd Lego Barbarians, 3rd 4-H Lego Wizards from Carter County.
The Judges Award went to the TechnoKats for their perseverance in continuing their activities after their coach Catherine Wallace became ill and passed away two months ago.
The three overall winners - Catlettsburg Creators, LEGO Raiders and LEGO Barbarians - are eligible to advance to the state tournament at Western Kentucky University on January 25
ACTC started the tournament in order to make the team building focus on science and technology available to area youth. This is the only tournament in the FIVCO area, and 10 of the 12 participating teams were started this year through support from ACTC Foundation grants.
This was a great start, said Karen Coburn, event coordinator and ACTC Manager of External Education Programs and event coordinator. We plan to make this tournament an annual event and hope to have even more teams competing next year.