Sunday, December 11 was an exciting, fun-filled day for our three competitive robotics teams! The three Camp Fire teams: The Midnight Makers, The League, and The Brick Alliance came to the competition ready to give it their all and have a blast!

For the last 12 weeks, our teams have been working hard to develop code, research innovation projects, and build relationships with each other, all in preparation for Sunday's competition at Mountain View High School in Bend.

The competition theme this year was "Masterpiece—art in technology," which really challenged our teams to think about all the different ways arts and technology are integrated. The competition focuses on four main components: the team's core values, robot design, innovation project, and the robot game.

Core values was something each of our team's incorporated from the beginning. They did this by choosing at each practice to really work as a team and embrace their differences while still challenging each other and having fun.

All our teams also really focused on incorporating advanced codes into their robot's programs, choosing to write detailed line, following codes as well as challenging their building strategies to create advanced attachments, for example, building pieces such as lifting mechanisms and attaching different sensors.

Each team really pushed their creative thinking when it came to their innovation projects, choosing to highlight a 3D printing afterschool club, an adaptive snow sports video game, and a model-building class for the community.

The robot game was something each team really enjoyed solving. They worked hard, collaborating to complete high-point-value missions using only the robot, the attachments they designed and built, and the code they created from scratch.

They had a chance to showcase all of their hard work in front of judges and peers alike at the competition, as well as learn from other teams in Central Oregon. We can't wait to see what our teams are able to bring to the table next year!