CSM Robotics

CSM Robotics Challenge

The CSM Robotics Challenge was started in 2007 as one of the projects funded through the college's National Science Foundation (NSF) grant.  The college received this grant in 2002 to study why Southern Maryland students were not pursuing study in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) fields.  We found that active learning activities such as robotics competitions help to make STEM learning fun and interesting for students.

This event has grown over the years to become the premier robotics competition event in Southern Maryland.  In 2007, twelve teams from four high schools competed.  The following year, in 2008, twenty three teams from thirteen schools competed.  In 2009, with the introduction of the junior division of competition, the competition grew to over sixty teams from forty schools.  This year, over 130 teams participated in our competitions.

Junior Division

This division uses the LEGO Mindstorm Robotics Systems as the competition platform.  For information about this system can be found at http://mindstorms.lego.com/.

Each year we will announce a new challenge for the competition.  This year, the challenge is "Save the Bay".  Teams must build robots to compete in the challenge and complete a research project related to the challenge.  

During the competition, teams must also appear before panel of judges. See the "Judging" page for more information on the judging sessions.

Tournament Structure

The tournament is divided into two parts: qualifying rounds and championship rounds.  In qualifying rounds, each team will get between three to four matches to demonstrate their robot on the challenge field.  

At the end of the qualifying rounds, the teams are ranked based on their average points for the matches.  Tie-breakers are used when teams have the same number of points and are based on the highest score achieved during the matches.

The top eight teams will advance to the championship rounds.  The championship rounds are played using the single-elimination style.  The winner of the final match is crowned the "Tournament Champion".