Hundreds of students — and their robots — from throughout Arkansas will put on a show this weekend at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.

This year’s BEST Robotics Game Day is expected to involve 300 to 400 student competitors. The event includes more than 20 high school and middle school teams from Arkansas and a squad from Alabama, according to Vernard Henley, Jr., assistant dean of the UALR College of Engineering & Information Technology. Another 400 people typically attend, with squads often bringing their own mascots, cheerleaders, and pep bands.

The robotics matches will begin at 9:30 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 7, and conclude at about 3:30 p.m. in the Jack Stephens Center. Admission is free.

BEST, which stands for Boosting Engineering Science and Technology, is a national six-week competition designed to get middle and high school students interested in engineering careers.

UALR is the host for the Little Rock hub competitions, and the university and other sponsors provide the required robotic design kits to teams free of charge. Mentors from UALR also help teams during the process, and the university will furnish judges for the competition.

Judges give scores in four categories: robot performance; engineering notebook; spirit and sportsmanship; and exhibit and team interview. The top-five finishers will advance to a regional competition.

The varied categories provide participation opportunities for students with a wide spectrum of skill sets.

“You have to have a pretty diverse team to advance,” Henley said.

This year’s theme is mining and geology, with teams scoring points when their robots pick up objects representing different types of minerals. One feature that will make this competition particularly challenging, Henley said, is that the value of the minerals will change as the competition progresses, based on the real-world concept of supply and demand.

As the supply of certain mined commodities grows, their values will decrease, so teams will need to adjust their strategies and possibly modify their robots while the games are occurring.

The Little Rock hub has about 2 percent of the nation’s BEST Robotics Game Day competitors but about 4 percent of the nationwide participation by minority groups that historically haven’t entered the engineering field in high numbers.

Henley said he’s proud of how accessible the Little Rock program has become — not just for minorities, but also for students who are financially challenged.

“We make a concerted effort to include some of these students who are underrepresented in engineering and technology,” he said.