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Contact: Jason Marton
jason.marton@tamuk.edu or 361-593-4143

Student robotic arms on display with best demo day Oct. 15

KINGSVILLE (October 14, 2005) — Eleven teams of area junior high and high school students were given the task of designing a robotic arm which simulates the appearance and the abilities of one sent to make repairs on the Hubble telescope. The teams will be given an opportunity to give a demonstration of what they have created thus far on Saturday, Oct. 15, from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. at Texas A&M University-Kingsville during the BEST Robotics Demo Day.

Hosted by the Frank H. Dotterweich College of Engineering, Demo Day will be held in the parking lot north of the Javelina Engineering Complex. In the event of bad weather, the demonstration will be set up in the Steinke Physical Education Center.

The public is invited to attend this free event.

BEST, or Boosting Engineering, Science and Technology, is a non-profit, volunteer organization whose mission is to inspire students to pursue careers in engineering, science and technology through participation in a sports-like, science- and engineering-based robotics competition.

The schools to be represented at Demo Day will be Flour Bluff High School; Port Aransas High School; Bruni High School; Sinton High School; Calallen High School; Gregory-Portland High School; Flour Bluff Middle School; George West High School; Tuloso-Midway High School; and Raymondville High School.

Demo Day is a time for the teams to show the simulated robotic arms they have created to competition officials. The arms do not need to function at this point – that will happen on Saturday, Oct. 22, in Calallen on Game Day. By that time, the arms will have to perform certain tasks and will be judged on how they perform the tasks.

Other components of the competition judges will be looking at on Oct. 15 or Oct. 22 include written and oral presentations, a web design and a poster competition.

This page last updated 14 October, 2005