Robotics Challenge Sparks Students' Passion For Stem Careers

More than 15,000 students from about 40 countries brought robots they’ve spent months building and fine-tuning to Louisville recently for a world championship designed to spark their interest in pursuing careers in fields such as engineering and technology.

These students, who span in grades from elementary school through college, are part of around 1,650 teams that have excelled in competitions held across the globe, culminating in the VEX Robotics World Championship.

This competition was sponsored by VEX Robotics, which makes hands-on educational tools teachers can use in their classes, and was being held in Louisville for the fifth time.

The championship, which Guinness World Records has recognized as the largest robotics competition, brought more than 25,000 people to town, including students, coaches and parents.

And it gave kids the chance to get to know peers from other countries as they compete to win trophies (and bragging rights) while expanding their knowledge of computer programming and other subjects, according to the event’s organizers.

“It takes you from your zone of comfort to another level,” said Alonso Montagut, a teenager from Gimnasio Campestre San Sebastian, a school in Bucaramanga, Colombia.

Plus, it gives him a chance to learn base skills that will be useful when he achieves his goal of working in nanotechnology.

For his teammate, Guillermo Machado, robotics is more of a hobby than a gateway to a science or technology career.

However, his mother, Judit Ferreira, said Colombia needs teens to spend their free time in productive ways like this.

She also noted that Colombia has a growing need to get more people working in fields of science, technology, engineering and math (often referred to collectively as STEM), as does Kentucky and many other states and countries.