FIRST LEGO League (FLL) announced 20 finalist teams will advance to the annual FIRST Championship in St. Louis as part of the annual FIRST LEGO League (FLL) Global Innovation Award presented by XPRIZE. Team Fast & Curious, from Rockville, Maryland was selected from 527 entries representing 22 countries and one U.S. territory. The team will travel to St. Louis from April 22 to 25 to present a creative solution to a question on one of today’s most relevant topics: the future of learning.
Fast & Curious’ project problem focuses on enabling learning in children affected by Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD).
Earlier this year, the team won the FLL Regional Championship at Potomac, MD, to qualify for the state-wide finals. At the Maryland State FLL Tournament the team was awarded the 1st place in the category of Gracious Professionalism.
Fast & Curious is a team of 5 girls and 5 boys from Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS):
- Bhargav Tumkur; 6th Grade Cabin John Middle School
- Arya Palan; 5th Grade Fallsmead Elementary School
- Saurav Pandey; 5th Grade Fallsmead Elementary School
- Dhira Vadlamudi; 3rd Grade Fallsmead Elementary School
- Ameya Deshmukh; 6th Grade Robert Frost Middle School
- Divyaveda Vadlamudi; 6th Grade Robert Frost Middle School
- Neytra Subramaniam; 8th Grade Herbert Hoover Middle School
- Priyanka Madhavan; 7th Grade Lakelands Park Middle School
- Reethi Padmanabhan; 8th Grade Takoma Park Middle School
- Medha Tumkur; 8th Grade Takoma Park Middle School
Following the St. Louis event, three finalist teams will travel to Washington, D.C., in June to be honored at a ceremony at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. The winning team will receive a cash prize of $20,000, and two runner-up teams will take home $5,000 each. Prize money must be used to further the teams’ ideas or to continue in FIRST programs.
Team Fast & Curious thanks the Rockville Science Center, Megha Soft Technologies and ASRC Federal for supporting it during the current FLL season.
To learn more about FIRST LEGO League and FIRST, go to www.usfirst.org
Contribution by Amar Vadlamudi, coach of Team Fast & Curious