Mississippi Best Robotics Competition is huge success
November 11, 2010
The Mississippi BEST 2010 Robotics Competition held on the Mississippi State University campus had the largest attendance in the five years since the Bagley College of Engineering began hosting the competition.
Fifteen schools, six sponsors and over 60 volunteers participated in the event where school teams competed with their original-design robots in the themed “lean engineering” competition and titled “Total Recall”.
The competition consisted of two areas for success. The robotics performance awards are based solely on the actual performance of the robot in accomplishing the assigned task. The top four teams in the robotics portion of the competition were Lausanne Collegiate School from Memphis, Tenn.; Holy Cross School from New Orleans, La.; Horn Lake High School from Horn Lake, Miss.; and East Rankin Academy from Pelahatchie, Miss.
The second area of competition tied in a marketing presentation and exhibit, spirit and sportsmanship and technical notebook scores with the robot performance score. The top three teams who placed with the BEST Award were Horn Lake High School from Horn Lake, Miss.; Holy Cross School from New Orleans, La.; and Starkville Christian Home Educators from Starkville, Miss.
Winners advance to the South’s BEST regional competition held at Auburn University, November 18th-20th at Beard-Eaves Memorial Coliseum. They will compete among the top 60 teams from 13 BEST Hubs in seven states.
Additional awards included:
Team T-shirt design: Horn Lake High School
Team Web-site design: Oak Grove High School, Hattiesburg, MS
Most Robust design: Lausanne Collegiate School
Team Spirit and Sportsmanship: Starkville Christian Home Educators
Founder’s Award for Design Creativity: Holy Cross High School
Attendees and award winners were congratulated for their efforts and encouraged to continue their academic pursuits by Dr. Sarah Rajala, dean of the Bagley College of Engineering and Dr. Jerry Gilbert, provost and executive vice president of Mississippi State University.
Schools enrolled for competition for the 2010 season included: Holy Cross High, Lausanne Collegiate School, Horn Lake High, Starkville Christian School, Oak Grove High, Center Hill High, Starkville Christian Home Educators, Long Beach High, East Rankin Academy, Holly Springs High School, Newton County Career and Technical Center, Newton County High/Middle School, Choctaw County Career and Technology Center, Sacred Heart School, Chambers Middle School, Simmons High School, and St. Joe High School.
The intent of the BEST program is to motivate middle and high school students to pursue fields of study and careers in engineering, science and technology, as well as introduce them to some of the engineering/scientific methods through mentoring by industry professionals and actual hands-on experience. Real-world engineering is demonstrated while providing an exciting and fun sports-like competition. For more information regarding the competition, please visit: www.msbest.msstate.edu.
Thanks to these sponsors students and schools are able to compete in BEST free of cost: Caterpillar, Mississippi EPSCoR, Mississippi Manufacturers Association, Hol-Mac Corporation, Nissan, and Sleep Innovations.
The Mississippi State University Bagley College of Engineering’s Department of Educational Outreach and Support Programs coordinated and hosted the event. The K-12 Outreach division provides activities that are designed to offer students and teachers the opportunity to explore and learn about the many different facets within the engineering field. In addition the outreach team plans and organizes summer camps that engage students with interests in math, science and computers in hands-on engineering projects. The interactive projects combine applications of electrical and computer science, chemistry and biological sciences, as well as aeronautic, geographical, mechanical, environmental, and civil sciences. Through these project activities, students discover how math and science are applied in the real world. Often, the experience inspires students to pursue a career in engineering.
For more information about Mississippi BEST or the K-12 Outreach Office, please contact Eric Heiselt.