LTU’s Robofest draws youth from around the world for STEM learning, competition

SOUTHFIELD—More than 700 students in grades 4-12 from 22 countries around the world are competing today and Saturday in Lawrence Technological University’s Robofest World Championships, an event that combines learning about robotics and software development with the fun and camaraderie of team sports.

Robofest students will be competing for scholarships to Lawrence Tech worth up to $80,000.

Established in 1999 by LTU computer science professor C.J. Chung, Robofest has hosted more than 36,800 students and involved thousands of volunteer mentors and coaches. Student teams of up to five members can participate in a variety of events. Students compete in the Junior (grades 5-8) and Senior (grades 9-12) divisions (except in the RoboParade competition, which allows fourth graders to compete). The teams earn the right to compete in the World Championships by placing at or near the top in regional competitions held around the world.

Robofest is unique among robotics competitions due to its low barriers to entry—teams compete using small robots that cost only a few hundred dollars, and all Robofest robots are controlled only by software, like robots used in real-world applications in industry.

The biggest Robofest competition is the Game category, in which robots are given tasks that change each year to keep the competition fresh. This year’s Game is called Robot Parking Valet, in which robots have two minutes to retrieve a “car key” (a medal placed at the opposite end of a six-foot table from the robot’s starting position) and move a “car” (a small black box) past obstacles to a designated “parking spot” on the table, then park the valet robot in a different spot.

Other Robofest competitions include RoboArts, in which students design and program robots to accomplish fine arts tasks; RoboParade, in which decorated robots follow a designated path; Bottle Sumo, in which robots compete to be the first to push a bottle or the opposing robot off a table; the Unknown Mission Challenge, in which students must program robots to accomplish tasks that are unknown until competition day; RoboMed, in which students design and program robots to accomplish healthcare-related tasks; Exhibition, an open category in which students are free to create a task and design and program a robot to accomplish it; and the Vision Centric Challenge, an advanced competition for high school students involving machine vision.

All Robofest events are open to the public. For more information, visit www.robofest.net.

Lawrence Technological University is one of only 13 independent, technological, comprehensive doctoral universities in the United States. Located in Southfield, Mich., LTU was founded in 1932, and offers more than 100 programs through its Colleges of Architecture and Design, Arts and Sciences, Business and Information Technology, Engineering, and Health Sciences, as well as Specs@LTU as part of its growing Center for Professional Development. PayScale lists Lawrence Tech among the nation’s top 11% of universities for alumni salaries. Forbes and The Wall Street Journal rank LTU among the nation’s top 10%. U.S. News and World Report lists it in the top tier of best Midwest colleges. LTU is also listed in the Princeton Review’s “America’s Best 390 Colleges 2025,” which includes the nation’s top 15% of colleges and universities. Students benefit from small class sizes and a real-world, hands-on, “theory and practice” education with an emphasis on leadership. Activities on Lawrence Tech’s 107-acre campus include more than 60 student organizations and NAIA varsity sports.

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