![\"427568_t607\"](\"http:\/\/blog.dan-kohn.us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/427568_t607.jpg\")
<\/a>\n[Stan Carroll \/ The Commercial Appeal]<\/p>\n
The DeSoto 4-H Robotineers robotics club’s high school-age team-champs in Mississippi competition in May – are getting the gears meshing to secure financial help to attend the Sept. 28-0ct. 2 national tourney at Purdue University in Indiana.<\/p>\n
The four-member team and its sponsor, 4-H agent Jessica Lindsey, are half-way toward their goal of raising about $2,SOO to send them to West Lafayette. Meanwhile, the youth program’s robotics activity is going and growing in the county.<\/p>\n
An appeal by Lindsey and team member Nathan Rodgers, a Hernando home-schooler, to the Board of Supervisors brought a $1,000 allocation from the county’s fund for advertising county resources. Added to that is about $550 already raised from donations from Rotary, Country Ford and the Pickering engineering firm.<\/p>\n
“We’re the pilot program from Mississippi going to this competition,” Lindsey said.<\/p>\n
“It’s been a great way to learn about teamwork, and it makes math and science part of the fun, a challenging game,” Nathan added.<\/p>\n
The other teen members are Renee Anderson of Hernando High, Rebecca Robinson of Lewisburg High and Audrey Johnson, a Hernando High graduate who’s now a Northwest Mississippi Community College freshman in Senatobia.<\/p>\n
Supervisors expressed fascination with robotics and teenage potential.<\/p>\n
“This is the field of the future,” said Supervisor Lee Caldwell of Nesbit. <\/p>\n
The DeSoto schools educator made Monday’s motion to allocate the funds after Dr. Joy Anderson, director of Mississippi State University Extension’s DeSoto office, which oversees 4-H, said robotics is a relatively new program and isn’t a line item on the 4-H budget.<\/p>\n
Robotics at 4-H is on a roll: “We have an average of 30 at our meetings in Hernando,” said Lindsey. “And there’ll be a new robotics club starting soon in Olive Branch,” she said.<\/p>\n
Robotics, underway for about five years now, is among the many activities in 4-H for youths ages 8-18.<\/p>\n
For information, contact Lindsey at 662-429-1343.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
From Commercial Appeal by Henry Bailey Jr Aug 21, 2013 [Stan Carroll \/ The Commercial Appeal] The DeSoto 4-H Robotineers robotics club’s high school-age team-champs in Mississippi competition in May – are getting the gears meshing to secure financial help … Continue reading