At the Kickoff, all teams were shown this year’s game field for the first time and received a
common kit of parts and a manual of game rules and regulations. Working with mentors, students
now have just six weeks to design, build, and test their robots to meet the season’s engineering
challenge. Once these young inventors create the robot, their teams participate in regional
competitions that measure the effectiveness of each robot, the power of collaboration, and the
determination of students.

In this year’s game, “Rack ‘N’ Roll,” students’ robots are designed to hang inflated colored
tubes on pegs configured in rows and columns on a 10-foot high center “rack” structure. Extra
points are scored by robots being in their home zone and lifted more than 4” off the floor by
another robot before the end of the 2 minute and 15 second match.