Lego robots, creative thinking, problem-solving skills and teamwork will be in action at the University of Waterloo tomorrow as 400 children aged nine to 14 compete in the FIRST Lego League (FLL) West Ontario Championships.

The FLL West Championship will be held on Saturday, January 11 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Physical Activities Complex at the University of Waterloo main campus. Admission is free and the public is welcome to attend.

FLL teams have spent the past 12 weeks building and programming Lego Mindstorm® robots that are part of this year’s Nature’s Fury challenge, tasking students to create solutions to natural disasters such as volcanic eruptions, flooding, earthquakes, tornadoes and tsunamis.  

The robots will compete in up to 16 missions on a specialized mat. Assignments include using levers to lift houses from flood zones, moving people to safe areas, bringing an airplane down for safe landing and traveling through an obstacle courses of fallen trees and walls.  Teams will also present projects where they apply creativity and science to develop new solutions to help people prepare, stay safe and rebuild in the wake of a natural disaster.  

Professor Maud Gorbet, of the Department of Systems Design Engineering at Waterloo, mentors student teams and co-ordinates the FLL West Championship.

"FIRST Lego League inspires kids to be science and technology leaders,” said Professor Gorbet. "Challenges, such as Nature’s Fury mimic real-world problems, and every year the challenge changes. Kids often come up with brand new solutions, and without inhibitions, they can sometimes be more successful than adults in solving problems affecting communities around the world.”

This year, 42 teams will compete from all over western Ontario. The provincial tournament winners will compete in the FIRST Lego League World Festival where they will present their innovations to a distinguished panel of scientists. More than 20,000 teams in more than 70 countries compete in hundreds of qualifying and championship tournaments each year.

Judges look at project presentation, robot performance, technical design and programming of the robot, and teamwork. The highest honour will go to the team that best exemplifies the spirit and values of the program. 

In Waterloo, Google provides drop-in sessions for local teams. “It’s a really nice environment for kids to learn from experts,” said Professor Gorbet. “The drop-in sessions not only provide a meeting place for teams to work on their robots, but the students learn advanced programming techniques and can better excel in all areas of the competition.”

The West FLL Provincials are funded by FedDev and the Province of Ontario, and are sponsored by the University of Waterloo and the Yves Landry Foundation. 

About the University of Waterloo

In just half a century, the University of Waterloo, located at the heart of Canada's technology hub, has become one of Canada's leading comprehensive universities with 35,000 full- and part-time students in undergraduate and graduate programs. Waterloo, as home to the world's largest post-secondary co-operative education program, embraces its connections to the world and encourages enterprising partnerships in learning, research and discovery. In the next decade, the university is committed to building a better future for Canada and the world by championing innovation and collaboration to create solutions relevant to the needs of today and tomorrow. For more information about Waterloo, please visit www.uwaterloo.ca.

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