Bedford High School is proud to be the home of Bucs Robotics, now in our third year of the FIRST Robotics Competition. Our team is located in Bedford, Massachusetts, a small suburban town north of Boston. Over the last four seasons, FIRST Robotics has given our student team members the opportunity to learn real-life engineering skills and practice gracious professionalism, all in a challenging and fun environment.

What is the FIRST Robotics Competition?
Beginning in early January, high school teams participating in the FIRST Robotics Competition have six weeks to design and build a robot that is able to participate in that season’s game challenge. The challenge changes each year and teams eagerly anticipate what the current challenge will be. Students have the opportunity to work with local engineers who mentor the team and provide support during the build season. At the end of the six- week period, teams from around the world ship their robots to holding facilities to wait for the start of regional competitions. Those who do well at the regional competitions have the opportunity to travel to the World Championship later in the spring.

What's the newest challenge?
This year's FRC challenge is known as Logomotion. It is played with two alliances, composed of three robots each. The teams compete to hang plastic shapes, which assemble the FIRST logo, horizontally. Teams score more points for assembling the logo at a higher level. At the beginning there is an auto no mouse period; during this period robots operate independently, without any human control. They can try to hang tubes by them selves to earn extra points. At the end of the game the robots deploy mini-bots which climb to the top of special poles on the playing field. The first ones score bonus points.

Where can we see Bucs Robotics compete?
We invite you to come participate in the fun and cheer on Bucs Robotics at the 2011 Manchester Regional, which is free and open to the public.