About 22 student teams from area elementary, intermediate, middle and high schools will put robots of their own design and construction to the test at the BEST Robotics and Science Competition at Texas A&M University-Kingsville on Saturday, Oct. 24.

The competition will be held at the Steinke Physical Education Center located on the Texas A&M-Kingsville campus on Engineering Drive between Armstrong Street and University Boulevard. Opening ceremonies begin at 12:45 p.m., with the competition scheduled to run through the afternoon. The public is invited to attend, free of charge.

Hub site A&M-Kingsville and the Frank H. Dotterweich College of Engineering provided the robot kits, competition locations and volunteers—all of which allow the participating schools to take part in the BEST competitions at no charge.

The competition is the culmination of more than a month’s work by the students to build a radio-controlled robot designed to pick up moving items and place them in a particular order. Judges will determine which teams’ robots are the best at their assigned tasks. The competition will be held in a series of three-minute, seed matches.

There also will be a second division in the competition, in which students show their original design work – be it a poster, model, audio/visual or other display – based around the theme, “High Octane.”

Event organizers are looking for competition judges in the community, willing to volunteer their time to be trained and to judge the day of the competition. Those interested should call 361- 593-2799.

The 22 South Texas elementary, intermediate, middle and high schools taking part in the competition include:

Presbyterian Pan Am High School

San Benito High School Flour Bluff High School Harmony Science Academy Brewster School Ingleside High School

Richard King High School

Gillett Intermediate School in Kingsville

Rio Grande City High School

Weslaco High School

School of Science and Technology of Corpus Christi

Bruni Middle School Harlingen High School Port Aransas High School Moody High School

Early College High School

Memorial Middle School in Kingsville

Harlingen South High School

Sabas Perez Magnet School for Engineering and Technology Applications

Pharr-San Juan-Alamo T-STEM Early College High School

Freer High School

Banquete High School

The 22 schools started their robotics journey in the BEST Competition kick-off on Sept. 12, at Memorial Middle School, where the student teams received competition guidelines and supplies. The robot designers come to the A&M-Kingsville campus Oct. 17 for Demo Day to test their designs on the official course.

BEST Robotics Inc. is a nonprofit, national volunteer organization. BEST stands for Boosting Engineering, Science and Technology.

The mission of the organization is to inspire students to pursue careers in engineering, science and technology through participation in a sports-like science and engineeringbased robotics competition.

For more information, contact Sheryl Custer at 593- 2799.