- Title: EGYPT: Egyptian robot-building team to compete for world title
- Date: 4th April 2010
- Summary: CAIRO, EGYPT (RECENT) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF 'FALCON EYE' TEAM ASSEMBLING ROBOT VARIOUS OF ROBOT TEAM MEMBER PLACING ROBOT ON GROUND ROBOT DRIVING ON GROUND CLOSE OF SIGN READING 'EGYPT'S CHAMPIONS' / TEAM ON STAGE WEARING MEDALS CLOSE ON WINNER'S MEDALS CLOSE ON CERTIFICATE OF CONGRATULATIONS GIVEN TO THE WINNERS BY AL-SAWY CULTUREWHEEL CENTRE (SOUNDBITE) (Sign Lan
- Embargoed: 19th April 2010 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Egypt
- Country: Egypt
- Topics: Science / Technology
- Reuters ID: LVA4RWQD465T5NC9RLAR22Y4GA9B
- Story Text: A group of young Egyptians wins an internationally sponsored robot-building competition, and will travel to the United States to take on teams from around the world.
A group of young Egyptians with special needs who stunned their fellow competitors by winning top prize in an internationally sponsored robot-building competition, are now preparing to travel to the United States where they will compete with teams from around the world.
The participants in the FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) Lego League (FLL) competition have an imposing enough task as it is - to create an autonomous LEGO robot and program it to carry out an assigned task in two and a half minutes.
The competition, set up in 1998 by American inventor Dean Kamen and the LEGO toy company, is designed to inspire people between the ages of 9-16 to develop their innovative and problem-solving skills through involvement in science and technology. Kamen invented the Segway Human Transporter and came up with the robot competition to encourage children's interest in science and technology.
The Falcon Eye team, whose members are all deaf, took this year's Robot competition in Alexandria in late February by storm, winning the event that brought together school teams from around the country.
The Egyptian competition was sponsored by the Arab Academy for Science and Technology, who assembled Falcon Eye with the help of the charity Asda, which works with underprivileged and special needs children.
A few weeks after their win the Falcon Eye team was honoured in a special ceremony at the al- Sawy CultureWheel and given special certificates.
Team member Walid Mohamed said he hoped that their achievement would help to change their status in society.
"Through this competition, our teachers, education officials and people in our community start to see us in a different light. I'm calling on the government to improve the sign language skills of teachers for the deaf, and the education faculty's graduates as well, so that there will be a revival of the deaf community in general in Egypt. Thank you," he said.
Mohamed al-Sawy, the director of the cultural centre, said that the FIRST Lego League competition was a good example of the importance of opening up new opportunities for children.
"Any child in the world who gets real care and gets a full chance to learn, to be trained, to gain experience from others, and to have the opportunity to be curious, and to work in a group, as we can see here - the best thing about this experience is teamwork - they are able to make their dreams come true together, and that is very important," he said.
Falcon Eye are still working on the other part of the FLL competition, which is to develop an invention that helps solve a real-world problem, and they say they are focused on an invention that aids conservation.
The team has also helped to develop innovative software that helps translate sign language into Arabic.
With their impressive win in Egypt under their belts, the team is now getting ready to travel to Atlanta Georgia in mid April, where they will test their skills against 100 other teams.
The competition's creators say over 140,000 kids from 42 countries have participated in their events. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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