Team 357 Royal Assault hosted this year's 2006 FIRST Lego League tournament for the Philadelphia Alliance. The team prepared for 38 registered teams through various tasks to assure that the event would run smoothly.

FIRST Lego League is a way for middle school students to apply math and science skills in a challenging, yet fun, competition. This year's challenge, Nano Quest, was aimed for students to gain a better understanding in the Nano-technology field. They do this by designing, building, and programming an RCX robot with Legos to accomplish missions on the field. Some of the missions varied from transferring objects that represented molecules from one area to another, to unsticking magnets for a certain amount of points. (For more information about the missions and point values, visit http://www.firstlegoleague.org/)

The tournament took place on December 2nd, 2006 at The Upper Darby High School. After several rounds of qualifying matches, and two presentations per team in front of a panel of judges, the event culminated in an awards ceremony.

The following teams won:
Champion's Award: team 2892-Star Tech
Research Project Award: team 909-MOE Maniacs
Robot Design Award: team 40-ROBOWhizards
Teamwork Award: team 151-Lego Ladies Blue
Robot Performance: team 151-Lego Ladies
Judges Award: team 910-TECHNO MOES
"Dare Mighty Things" Award: team 748-Renegade
Team Spirit Award: team 255-Lego Islanders
The top three scores throughout the competitions were achieved by:
Team 151-Lego Ladies Blue: 300pts
Team 40-ROBOWhizards: 299pts
Team 154-Lego Ladies Gold: 285pts

In addition to these awards a member of Royal assault, Andrew Adaman, was recognized and awarded the Coach/Mentor award for volunteering and mentoring a FIRST Lego League team at the Beverly Hills Middle School.
(For more information on other team's results please visit http://fll.team357.org/?page=results)

In conclusion, The champions of our tournament, team 2892-Star Tech, will be representing the Philadelphia Alliance by competing at Nationals in Atalanta, Georgia. For more information about FIRST Lego League visit http://www.firstlegoleague.org/

Article by Lauren Campion
Posted on 2006-12-02