SOUTHFIELD –

On Saturday, Sept. 19, Lawrence Technological University will host the national

championships to determine who will represent the United States at the World Robot

Olympiad this November in Qatar.

The

competition will be held at the Don Ridler Field House on LTU’s campus at 21000

West Ten Mile Road in Southfield. The opening ceremony begins at 9 a.m., and

the closing ceremony is scheduled to start at 4:40 p.m. The event is open to

the public, and admission and parking are free.

WRO started

in Singapore in 2004, and this is the second year the United States will send a

team. Nearly 20,000 elementary, middle and high school students as well as

university teams from over 50 countries are participating.

Eighty-eight

teams competed in state qualifiers here in the United States, and 43 teams have

advanced to the national finals from California, Florida, Texas, New York, New

Jersey, Illinois, Louisiana, Washington and Michigan.

WRO-USA

differs from many other robotics competitions because the winners will

represent the United States in international competition. “Being selected to

represent your country really means something. The American teams will be

competing against the best teams from around the world,” said LTU Professor CJ

Chung, who is coordinating the national competition for the second time.

Last year

three students from Canton and Northville won a bronze medal in the WRO

competition held in Russia, while a team from LTU finished fifth in the

university division.

Chung, who

teaches computer science, was selected to lead WRO-USA last year because of his

leadership role in LTU’s Robofest competition. Like WRO, Robofest makes it fun

for students to learn important principles of science, technology, engineering

and math, known as the STEM subjects.

“Robotics is

a game changer in many fields including education, since it provides a true

interdisciplinary hands-on STEM learning environment,” Chung said. “Our country

needs many more people with technology knowledge and skills, and student

competitions like the WRO can help us achieve that goal.”

In this

year’s WRO competition, students must build and program a robot that can dive

and explore under the sea for pearls, or collect five artifacts in an unknown

environment, or collect supplies and deliver them.

In the open

category the task is to create robots that can help humans explore for natural

resources in potentially hazardous environments.

WRO General

Secretary Claus Ditlev Christensen of Denmark will give opening remarks at LTU

and observe the WRO-USA finals.

For more

information, go to www.wroboto.us.