If a team could choose an organization to provide engineering mentors for its robotics competition, you would think NASA would be often at the top of the list. With its resources and expertise, NASA's sponsorship would be a benefit for any of the teams competing in the FIRST Robotics competition.

For the three FIRST competitors from Alabama, and one from Illinois that will be sponsored by NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, AL, the reward is surely a highly sought-after opportunity going into the 2009 competition.

The four teams are from Limestone Career Technical Center in Athens, AL, Decatur High School and Austin High School in Decatur, AL, Walker County Center of Technology in Jasper, AL, and Oregon Community School District in Oregon, IL.

The teams were selected based on award-winning proposals submitted to a competitive grant opportunity. Of the 1500 teams of 37,000 students that competed in the 42 regional contests last year, NASA field centers and industry partners sponsored over 200.

At the 16th annual FIRST Robotics Competition, the teams will compete in games with robots they’ve designed and built with the support of engineering mentors from NASA and other sponsors.

The design challenge for the 2009 competition will be presented at national and local kickoff events in January. A national kickoff at FIRST headquarters in New Hampshire will be broadcast on NASA TV.

Since 1960 Marshall Space Flight Center has enabled the nation’s exploration of space. Advanced exploration and research projects are conducted at the state-of-the-art facilities with the goals of better understanding the universe, making scientific discoveries, improving life on Earth, and working toward the reality of working and living in space.

In its history Marshall has provided the rockets that powered Americans to the moon, developed the space shuttle propulsion system, and managed the development of Skylab, Spacelab, the Hubble Space Telescope and many other projects and instruments.

With the historic, scientific reputation that the Marshall Space Flight Center has, there are about 100 students who are very lucky to have them on their side.