FIRST gives kids first look at 2008 robotics challenge

Manchester – Tens of thousands of people around the globe yesterday morning were tuned in to what was happening in a Southern New Hampshire University gymnasium, where local inventor Dean Kamen lifted the veil on this year's FIRST Robotics Competition.

The event, broadcast live by NASA, sounded the starting gun for the 37,500 high school students expected to compete in the annual science and engineering contest. Students will have six weeks to design and build a robot that can perform difficult tasks, while racing around a track. The robots' performances will be judged at regional competitions across the U.S. in the coming months.

"This is not just a game," said Dave Lavery, who works for NASA and is one of the brains behind the challenge of FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology).

"What we're going to ask you to do has some real connections to real-world technologies," he said.

This year's game is called "Overdrive." For the teams, the challenge will be getting their robots to grab and throw large inflatable balls while circling a track -- while their opponents do the same thing on the same track. Everything is scored, and the team with the most points wins.

In Manchester, hundreds of students and their mentors left the bleachers in a mad rush toward the track, an oval-shaped, 54-foot playing surface. It was the first time any of them had seen it, and they wasted no time scrutinizing its every detail.

Some brought tape measures. A few students knelt down to feel the carpet, the FIRST equivalent of Astroturf.

"There are little subtleties you kind of want to get. Like this bump," said Ryan Foley, 21, of Atkinson, grazing his hand against the carpet. "If you build your robot too low to the ground, you might not get over this bump."

Students from Walpole High School were taking digital photographs of the playing field. Their plan, they said, was to pick up the kit of parts and head straight back to school -- on a Saturday, no less -- to join their teammates for a daylong brainstorming session. They didn't plan to stop until at least 10 p.m.

"We've been known to work until the wee hours of the morning," said one member, 17-year-old Kat Cullen.

FIRST competitions draw students from all 50 states and seven foreign countries. This year's championship will be held April 17-19 at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta.

Kamen, the event's founder, reflected on the competition's humble beginnings. In 1992, just 28 teams competed on a small playing field in a New Hampshire high school gym.

Seventeen years later, he said, "It is just out of control, in a wonderful way."