Local schools triumph in Whirlpool LEGO robot competitions
This month saw the thrilling return of the FIRST® LEGO® League Challenge tournament to
Peterborough and Yate, a regional STEM competition delivered by the Institute of Engineering and
Technology (IET) and sponsored by Whirlpool, the home of Hotpoint. Six teams of local primary school
children, aged 9 to 11, competed in a range of LEGO robotics-themed challenges at the Hotpoint
showroom in Peterborough. This followed from Whirlpool’s sponsorship of the South-West tournament
at their tumble dryer factory in Yate near Bristol at the start of March which hosted 9 local primary
schools.
Ian Moverley, Director of UK Communications at Whirlpool said: “We’ve been proud to fully fund the
Peterborough and Yate tournaments for the last 4 years, and long may that continue. It has been a
pleasure to see the innovation and enthusiasm expressed by the younger students today. We have
been extremely impressed by their programming skills and creative ideas when solving the problem of
energy in today’s world. A big thank you to all the volunteers who gave their time to help run the final
as well including many colleagues from our Peterborough and Yate sites.”
Following months of preparation, student teams battled against each other with LEGO robots which
they had designed, built and programmed to autonomously complete as many missions as possible on
a LEGO playing field, all within the 2.5-minutes. Teams were also tasked with presenting their
Innovation Project to a panel of judges which, this year, involved identifying a problem tackling energy
storage and consumption. In addition, students were assessed on their strategy and computer science
skills that were behind their robot’s design.
Longthorpe Primary School were crowned overall champions of the Peterborough tournament with
Frenchay Primary School the Yate winners, both securing a place in the national finals, which will be
hosted by the IET at the end of April in Harrogate.
Through the FIRST® LEGO® League tournament, teams are encouraged to demonstrate the FIRST®
signature set of Core Values which celebrate discovery, innovation, impact, inclusion, teamwork and
fun.