Students from 15 middle, junior, and high schools in central Arkansas and the Delta will compete in the BEST Robotics Tournament, sponsored by UALR’s Donaghey College of Engineering and Information Technology (EIT), from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 6, at Little Rock Central High School’s gymnasium. The competition will take place on a 576-square-foot playing field build by students from UALR’s Department of Construction Management.

The BEST — Boosting Engineering, Science, and Technology — tournament requires each team’s robot to perform tasks associated with product manufacturing operations on two production lines. The object is to successfully process and package as much “good” product as possible while striving for Six Sigma quality levels on each production line.

Defective products are to be removed from the production floor and returned to a location that is designated as the manufacturer. All of the tasks are to be accomplished in three minutes. The competition culminates six weeks of work for the 15 teams.

The teams will compete in four different categories: project engineering notebook, team exhibit and interviews, spirit and sportsmanship, and robot performance. Students designed, programmed, and built robots that would conduct specific activities. The top performers will advance to the Regional Competition at the University of Arkansas at Fort Smith in December.

The 15 teams represented are, Pulaski Heights Middle School; Hall High School; Bauxite High School; Stuttgart High School; Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts; Poyen High School; Central High School; Cabot High School; eSTEM High School; LISA Academy; Benton High School; Hamburg High School; Two Rivers High School; Watson Chapel High School; and Ouachita Rivers Schools’ Oden Campus.
For more information, contact Vernard Henley, EIT’s director of recruitment and outreach, at 501-569-8203.