MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109. TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

Contact: Carolina Martinez (818) 354-9382



       INTERNET ADVISORYApril 6, 2001 2001

       Tune in today and Saturday and see hundreds of robots and their creators -- high school students -- compete in a national robotics competition sponsored by NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

       Seven teams sponsored by JPL are taking part in the contest at Walt Disney World's EPCOT Center in Orlando, Fla. Watch the students and their robots compete on NASA Television or on the Web during a live broadcast and Webcast of the FIRST Robotics National Competition on Friday, April 6 from noon to 2 p.m., PDT (3 to 5 p.m, EDT) and on Saturday, April 7 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., PDT (1 to 5 p.m., EDT).

The Webcast can be accessed at

http://robotics.nasa.gov/first2001.html .

The NASA TV schedule is available at http://www.nasa.gov/ntv/breaking.html .

       FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) is a non-profit organization whose mission is to generate an interest in science and technology through a robotics competition that provides hands-on activities, fosters teamwork and gives students access to engineers who help them build their own robots.

       NASA has awarded more than 100 sponsorships to high schools nationwide. Locally, JPL sponsored 24 of the 49 teams that competed in the Southern California regional competition on March 15-17.

       JPL is managed for NASA by the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.

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