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Several hallways of UVSC's Computer Sciences and Engineering Building were lined with robot courses made of white paper and black marker Monday, along with huddled groups of students whispering and tinkering with their machines as they tried to complete the robot challenge.
About 950 students competed in seven events at Utah Valley State College's annual Technology Expo, from the 3-D derby to robot challenge to cabinetry skills, said Jennifer Clegg, assistant dean of the school of technology and computing.
This was the first year for the robot challenge, which proved to be no smooth drive.
Grant Flygare, UVSC's director of experimental learning and leadership, said the problems were the best part of the challenge.
"That's where it comes alive is having the real problems and then trying to solve the real problems," he said.
The students had to create a robot that could face four challenges: speed, terrain, ball throwing and command.
"This is really just a super engineering challenge," said Curtis Craig, a physics and electronics teacher at American Fork High School. Craig's students had two tasks left Monday when they ran into a problem. The software wasn't communicating with their robot -- a necessary step if they wanted to complete the command challenge, in which the robot wouldn't have a course line to follow and had to be told what to do by the team.
"The biggest challenge other than all the problems we're having now ... was getting it to throw the ball," said American Fork junior Sean Halbleib.
The project wasn't without its perks for Halbleib, who said he enjoyed building his first robot.
"We just had a lot of fun in class," he said.
Craig said the students had gained a lot of knowledge from the other teams -- there were nearly 20.
"Everybody's learning from each other and they're going to take it back with them," Craig said.
• Brittani Lusk can be reached at 344-2549 or at
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