The Summit Elementary Bionical Bison robotics team competed in a Regional competition on December 7th at the Casper Events Center. The challenge was to research a natural disaster and build a model and poster board showing what they learned. The Summit Bionical Bison green team, comprised of team members Konnor Barthlama, Jack Egan, Bradyn Adels, Kaitlyn & Kendra Barbarick and Kynlee Griffith ,choose to research tornadoes.  They built a model depicting a tornado’s fury and the destruction it caused while leaving the scene of a neighborhood and an ambulance coming down the street to help people hurt in the tornado.  The kids worked for 6 weeks building models from instructions and programing the model to do certain tasks. They then worked another 6 weeks building their model and creating a show me poster to share what they learned.

At this competition they were awarded a "Solid As A Rock" award for a model that was described as “built to last with great ingenuity and creativity". With this award the group applied to go to the World Expo in St. Louis and upon review of their online showcase and their award they were one of 40 teams chosen from all over the world to be invited to the World Expo.  They are the first team from Wyoming to ever attend the expo at the Jr FLL Level. The World Expo is a huge event with 3,800 total teams (only 40 teams at the Jr level)  and 26,000 kids from over 14 countries competing.The competition is April 23-24

Since NCSD policy does not allow for this age group of students to go on overnight trips that the school district sponsors and pays for, the parents must sponsor the event to get the children to the world competition. They have had local businesses and individuals who have already started to donate and have an account set up through the First Interstate Bank's Mills branch in their name. The team is looking for donations, both monetary as well as anything they can add to a raffle that is forthcoming to help defray some of the costs of travel.

If you are interested in donating or would like more information.  Please contact Dallen Griffith at 259-9689 or Kraig Barthlama at 267-3280.

More From 104.7 KISS-FM