SDSGC continued to provide funding and staff support to various robotics programs across South Dakota during FY2018, including FLL, BEST, VEX, and 4-H Robotics. Among 71 (9 from neighboring states) elementary and middle school SD FLL teams (443 students), 36 teams (5 from neighboring states) qualified at their respective regional competitions to advance to the Tenth Annual SD FIRST LEGO League (FLL) Robotics State Championship tournament to be held at affiliate Augustana University on Feb 2, 2019, at which 234 students and 83 coaches are anticipated to participate with $9,000 in support from SDSGC. During the FY2018 program year, one-third of the teams moving on to the state tournament were first year teams demonstrating that new teams are forming every year. One of the 2018 regional competitions to qualify for the SD FLL State Championship is described in detail in the paragraph below. SDSGCâs affiliate SDSU hosted the Jackrabbit BEST Robotics Hub Competition on Oct. 27, 2018 with 15 teams (253 students) in attendance. SDSU also facilitated the 4-H Robotics and Engineering Challenge at the SD State Fair on Sept. 1, 2018 with 12 teams (48 students), and South Dakota 4-H held statewide training sessions for robotics coaches in January, March, June, and September 2018 with Space Grant support. Through those trainings, 86 coaches were reached.

SDSM&T hosted 2018 regional FLL robotics competition on Saturday, Dec. 8, 2018 at East Middle School in Rapid City. FLL is an educational extracurricular activity for youth ages 9-14 that focuses on teaming, societal challenges, and STEM. Teams worked together since August 2018, learning to build and program competitive autonomous robots which had to complete various tasks within a given time to earn points. The 2018 event included 18 registered teams, a record number for the competition. Additionally, a junior league featured another two teams of 6 to10-year-old students and one FRC Rapid Acceleration high school team. In total, 109 youth participated. The 2018 theme was is Into Orbit, challenging students to design and build robots that can solve various problems associated with human space exploration. The competition is divided into four parts consisting of core values, project presentation, robot design judging, and robot games. The Rapid City Qualifier event was a huge success thanks to East Middle School administrators, SDSM&Tâs Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering Jason Ash, and all the coaches/mentors and volunteers. Ten (10) FLL teams qualified for the FLL State Championship in Sioux Falls to be held on February 2, 2019 as described above.