Late last year, a team of children from Carramar Primary School and Carramar Secondary School entered the FIRST® LEGO® League challenge.
It’s a competition that encourages kids to think like scientists and engineers.
In teams of up to 10, the students build, program and compete with a robot. In doing so, they are learning about a real-world problem in science and developing practical solutions for it.
Allight proudly sponsored new T-shirts for the children to wear at the national competition – held in Sydney last November. During the competition, they all learnt skills that will last a lifetime.
Each year, the competition is based around a theme, such as natural disasters, senior citizens, food health & safety, climate change, medical science, and nanotechnology. The tournament is run with the feel of a sporting event, so teams compete like crazy while having the time of their lives.
What the teams accomplish is nothing short of amazing. The competition is judged on three important elements:
Robot
Each of the teams designed, built and programmed a LEGO® robot to complete a series of challenges. The robot had to operate on pre-programmed instructions, and complete as many tasks as possible in only 2 minutes and 30 seconds. Teams compete on adjacent tables to score as many points as possible, and a number of awards are given for robot performance, programming innovation and clever design.
Project
Every year, teams study the theme and develop solutions to problems they’ve identified in society. Through the project, teams learn more about the competition theme and present their ideas to a panel of judges. While working on the project, it teaches the students to research, think critically, work as a team and speak publicly. The project shows students they have the power to change the world, as teams can share successful ideas with their community, their school, their families, even all of Australia and the world.
Core Values
Throughout the competition, teams are judged on teamwork, Cooperation, and Gracious Professionalism. It’s designed to develop the students of today into the responsible citizens of tomorrow. Good examples of Core Values are observed and recognised with awards and trophies.
The Carramar school kids did themselves proud.
A team of secondary students from St. Stephens Carramar – calling themselves the Raging Comets – took up the challenge and won the Research Award for their project during the regionals held on Saturday 17 November 18.
They went on to compete in the state competition held at Curtin University on Saturday 24 November 2018 and again won the Research Award for their project. Then, they flew to Sydney to compete in the national Finals which was held at Macquarie University on the weekend of 8 and 9 December 2018.
It’s at the National event that they looked their best in new T Shirts sponsored by Allight. The T Shirts helped give the team a professional and unified look, cementing their cohesive approach and showing the world that they had each other’s backs.
Although they did not receive a placing, they did receive a special Judge’s Award – Reaching for the Stars. This was in recognition for their research and innovative design solution.
In preparation the competition, the Carramar Secondary team also enjoyed the fantastic opportunity to visit the CSIRO Australian Resources Research Centre. At the CSIRO, they shared their work with professional scientists and researchers and tested their solution on the XRAY CT scanner.
The Carramar Primary team, Galaxy Goats, had a very strong first round in the Robot Challenge and were placed highly on the leader board. They ended the event in 24th place out of 69 teams from around Australia. What a fantastic effort and a brilliant experience for all involved!
Ben Hall, Allight General Manager – Sales was quick to praise all the students and their amazing efforts.
“Allight is very proud to have supported the students of St Stephens School in this fantastic competition,” he said.
“St Stephens is a local school and the home to children of several Allight staff members. The efforts of the Secondary team to make the national final and win a Judges Award was sensational. Congratulations to all.”
“Even more, for the Galaxay Goats to rank so highly on the leader board out of such a massive field of talented students from every primary school in Australia should make them feel very proud.”
“We are all very excited to see such up-coming talent within the ranks of the Allight family”.
