By Aly Davis

Contributing Writer

DESTREHAN – On Saturday the Destrehan High School gym was filled with middle school students and robots.

Eight teams made of up to 10 middle school students ages 9 through 14 showcased robots of their own creation in the qualifiers for the FIRST LEGO League Robotic Competition. This qualifier, hosted by the Wildcat Robotics Team, is one of seven that took place Nov. 10 and 17 leading up to the Louisiana Regional Championship in New Orleans, which will take place Dec. 8.

The mission statement of the FIRST LEGO League explains that the League is designed to get students “excited about science and technology — and teach them valuable employment and life skills.”

Each year the FIRST LEGO League presents a challenge, which is based on a real-world science and engineering problem. The Challenge for 2012 is named “Senior Solutions,” with the goal to improve the quality of life for senior citizens in our community through independence, engagement and connectivity.

There are three parts of the challenge: a robot, a project with presentation to the judges and the FLL Core Values, which include teamwork and friendly competition. There are a number of different missions that represent various health concerns or hobbies for senior citizens that the teams and their robots can take on. During the two minutes and 30 seconds on the challenge field robots may bowl, garden, walk a dog, fix a broken chair, pick a specific colored block and go over a bridge.

“It’s LEGOs. How can you not get involved?,” quipped Annette Oertling, assistant dean of the K-12 Outreach at Tulane University in New Orleans and coordinator of the event. Oertling has been on the planning committee for the Louisiana FIRST LEGO League Robotic Competition since its introduction to Louisiana in 2003.

The FIRST program, which stands for “For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology,” “is in place all throughout the country,” and has grown exponentially, now boasting “over 20,000 teams in over 70 countries.” FIRST was started in the early ‘90s for high school teams, and in 1998 the opportunity to compete was extended to middle school-aged students.

Emily Kraus and Grant Roberts, along with members of their team, the Alpha Gators, attend Gretna No. 2 Academy for Advanced Studies and had worked on the “Senior Solutions” challenge for eight weeks before coming to participate in the competition. Their goal, stated Roberts, was to program a robot that might be able to help in real-life situations.

FIRST Lego League encourages helping everyone and reaching down to help younger children.

Destrehan High School’s team, Wildcat Robotics, volunteered to host Saturday’s qualifying competition, and students from Oertling’s classes at Tulane University volunteered to be mentors for these middle school-aged teams, as well as to be judges and referees at the event.

Each team must also have at least one adult advisor. The advisor promises that the students will do all the programming, research, problem solving and building.

Debbie Robicheaux is a moderator and teacher at Sacred Heart of Jesus School in Norco. She and a fellow moderator have been working as advisors with the Cardinal Coders team twice a week for three months in preparation for this event.

“There’s still a lot of work to do (on the robot and its programming),” Robicheaux said, “but we just need to make it through this qualifying round.”

Then the team will be able to make the needed adjustments before the Louisiana Regional Championship Dec 8.

For the past three years Yutaka Hitomi, education technology coordinator at the International School of Louisiana in New Orleans, has been mentoring his school’s teams. So many students were interested in participating that their school was able to create two teams of 10 students. Gabriel Allen, one of Hitomi’s students, explained they “have had a lot of fun with the robot,” but they “also wanted to make it effective.”

FIRST LEGO League is a way for middle school students to work with a team to find solutions to problems that are important to men and women in our communities today. To find or create a FIRST LEGO League team, to see the results of the qualifying events or to get more information, visit lafll.org or firstlegoleague.org.