With the announcement of FIRST and Lego splitting on robotics competitions for Elementary and Middle school students, I am looking at other competitions for those age groups. These are NOT endorsements of any program, just links to other programs to look into:
VEX IQ and VEX V5 are both active in the Memphis area and it has a full K-12 program that the students can grow with.
Lego Education – info about the split and, at the bottom of the page is a link to sign up for a news letter.
FIRST Lego League – who knows when they will announce their plans for their new competition but I would keep an eye on THEIR BLOG on the “Future Edition”
US Engineering League (USEL) Youth Robotics they do seem to be associated with the World Robot Olympiad (I just heard about this competition…need to look into more)
Botball Educational Robotics
National Robotics Challenge (I just heard about this competition…need to look into more) Does look like it is only in Ohio at this time.