Help Teach Future Robotic Overlords

The Robotics Society, which is the non-profit parent of RoboGames, formerly ROBOlympics, is competing for a $25,000 grant to teach underprivileged kids hands on robotics. The grant is through the Pepsi Refresh project, which Pepsi is using as a sort of community stimulus program to give away millions of dollars to fund ideas that they feel refresh communities, education, and the arts. If RoboGames can get enough votes then well over a hundred kids in the greater San Fransisco area will get their own autonomous robots, plus a semester of after school classes teaching building and programming robot skills. Ultimately, these kids will get to compete in next year’s RoboGames.

As a former underprivileged kid from the greater San Fransisco area, I have to say that I would have loved this sort of opportunity. I just registered my account and placed my vote. You can vote once a day, every day, and from what I understand, there are a number of Pepsi products that give you some sort of points which you can also use to vote with as well.

Here’s the link to vote: http://pep.si/nHlOZZ
or you can vote by texting 107947 to Pepsi (73774) to vote from your mobile phone.

For those interested in just watching competitive robot annihilation at it’s best, the ComBots Cup VI returns to the San Mateo Fairgrounds October 28th to 30th with the biggest cash prize purse in robot combat. Here is a little taste of the action:

Shortlink:

Posted by Forrest Black on August 3, 2011. Filed under Art, Happenings, Headline. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry