FIFTEEN high schools will compete at the Tagisang Robotics Competition 2.0 of the Department of Science and Technology – Science Education Institute.

Veteran teams from Bangkal High School, Caloocan National Science and Technology High school, Makati Science High School, Malabon National High School, Manila Science High School, Marcelo H. del Pilar National High School, Pasig City Science High School, Pitogo High School, Quezon City High School, Rizal High School, Rizal National Science High School, San Francisco High School, Sen. Renato “Compañero” Cayetano Memorial Science and Technology High School, Taguig Science High School, and Valenzuela School of Math and Science are scheduled to battle each other.

DOST-SEI introduced a new game in this year’s competition.

“The new game is challenging enough given that we can’t have face-to-face matches. But the test of skills and wits remains. For them to garner points, the tasks must be done successfully with mastery, efficiency and speed in mind. So, we believe this TRC 2.0 will give them the thrill while enabling them to collaborate and learn from each other,” Dr. Josette Biyo, DOST-SEI director, said.

The competition is divided into two parts – the qualifying matches called “heats” and the final competition

The qualifying and championship rounds will be conducted virtually. Teams will join via a web conferencing application. The teams shall also send the code remotely to the onsite team that will upload the code to a replica mobot that will perform the tasks like mobot movement, line and color sensing and motor control, among others.

This measure ensures the safety of the students while being actively involved in the competition.

Teams will be given three heat rounds to finish, scheduled between February and April 2022.

The Top 8 teams with the highest aggregated points will advance to the TRC Championship Round in May 2022. The school with the highest points after the qualifying rounds will win the Best Team Award.

The Championship Round will task mobots to navigate around a playing field and sort-colored pallets to their respective colored areas to simulate robotics applications in smart warehouse. The team that finishes the task with the fastest time will be crowned the TRC 2.0 Champion and will receive a cash grant and trophy from DOST-SEI.

To build their microcontroller-powered mobots, DOST-SEI provided the teams with a standard kit-of-parts and student training kits.