BEST Robotic Regional Championship

Middle and high school students from the tri–state region and as far away as Pennsylvania meet to battle out whose robot is the best.

34 teams brought their robot to compete in the Northern Plains BEST Robotics regional championship.

BEST stands for boosting, engineering, science and technology.

This year’s competition theme is “Pay Dirt.”

Teams designed and built a robot to repair and operate in an underground mine.

“This competition inspires my students to do better and to know that they have potential. A lot of the mentors released lists to their teams and they let the students conquer it. And when the students feel that they get to have that ownership they see that their hands are powerful and whatever they’re creating and doing is something that is going to help lead them in that STEM pathway,” says NDSU’s STEM Outreach Coordinator Holly Erickson

The mission is to inspire students to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics, collectively known as STEM.

This is NDSU fourth year to host the regional championship.