Students compete at third annual SOKY Robot Royale

BOWLING GREEN, Ky. (WBKO) - The third annual SOKY Robot Royale took place Wednesday morning at Rich Pond Baptist Church.

Around 350 elementary, middle and high school students from all over the region gathered at the event to compete in various robotic events and learn about different areas of computer science.

The Bowling Green Police Department and Kentucky Educational Television (KET) were on hand to show the students how technology and robotics play a role in everyday life.

Organizers of the event hope that it will spark an interest in pursuing careers in technology.

“We want this to be an exciting event that might hook them into the interest of computer science,” said Matt Kresslein, Instructional Technology Coordinator for WCPS. “We want them to be interested and say ‘hey that’s pretty cool’ and it’s more than just coding.”

Other stations at the event included computer repair, coding and 3D printing, which gave participants hands-on learning experience.

The robotics competition saw teams of students from different schools bring in robots that they have been building and programming this school year.

“Every week when we have our meetings, the students kind of make tweaks and they help each other to build the best code and build the best robot that they can,” said Chloe DeJarnette, Math Teacher at Rich Pond Elementary. “I think this is definitely going to be a great opportunity for them in the future.”

Winners of the competition won trophies for putting their coding, engineering and robotics skills to work.

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