MUSCLE SHOALS-Saturday, October 19, 2013, 10 a.m. – 4p.m. Northwest-Shoals Community College and the Shoals Chamber of Commerce will host 16 schools at the 2013 BEST (Boosting Engineering, Science and Technology) Robotics Competition. The event will be held at Northwest-Shoals gymnasium and is free to the public.
The season Kicked-Off on September 7th. Junior high and high 
school student teams have been working on their robot design & engineering process for six weeks and are now ready to find out what their robots and drivers can accomplish in the heat of the moment. The top three winning teams will advance to South’s BEST Regional Championship at Auburn University, December 7 – 8, 2013.
This year, the robots are built to accomplish the specific challenges of this year’s game – design a prototype robot to construct a CPU over the course of three fabrication stages. The world keeps advancing in electronics and computer technology. This BEST game challenge allows students to become more familiar with the tiny elements that make up the basic operations of computers.
BEST Robotics’ long term goal strives for students to become interested in careers in science, technology,
engineering and math (S.T.E.M.). This year’s game theme will not only teach these principles, but may help boost entrance into career paths surrounding aeronautical engineering, perhaps introducing some to new areas of interest.
In addition to the Robotics game challenge, the students must compile a comprehensive Project Engineering Notebook, and are encouraged to develop an entire “company” around their product. The teams have the option to compete in an oral marketing presentation, to design and build a trade show booth, a web site, a video commercial for their product, t-shirt designs and more. They also compete for the Spirit and Sportsmanship Award.
BEST is free to participating schools. The public is welcome to attend BEST Game Day, Saturday, October
19th, Northwest-Shoals Community College gym on the Shoals 
campus. The doors will open at 8 a.m. The games begin around 10:00 a.m.
The Shoals Chamber of Commerce and NW-SCC are currently looking for judges and volunteers for the competition, October 19th. Anyone interested can call the Shoals Chamber of Commerce at (256) 764-4661 to register as a volunteer or for more information.
PARTICIPATING SCHOOLS
V= Veteran
N= New
Allen Thornton Career Technical Center (V)
Bankhead Middle School (Walker Co., AL) (V)
Brooks Middle and High School (V)
Cherokee High School (V)
Covenant Christian School (N)
Creekside Academy (V)
Haleyville enter of Technology (N)
Hatton High School (V)
Lexington High School (N)
Loretto High School (Lawrence Co., TN) (V)
Moulton Middle School (V)
Muscle Shoals High School (V)
Phil Campbell High School (V)
Russellville City Schools (V)
Sheffield High School (N)
Wilson High School (V)
NW Alabama BEST Robotics is a workforce development partnership between the Shoals Chamber of Commerce and Northwest-Shoals Community College. BEST Robotics, Inc. is the nationwide program currently in 19 states, with 14 Hubs and around 300 teams. For more information visit:http://nwalabamabest.org or www.bestinc.org.
MEDIA RELEASE NWSCC/TRENT RANDOLPH
