Local Team LOL heading to the FLL World Festival and Championship

FIRST Lego League (FLL) team, comprising six girls, including two from Elm Grove, has advanced to the FIRST Lego League World Festival and Championship in St. Louis being held from April 22-25.

Team LOL is a third year robotics team comprised of girls in grades 5-8 sponsored by Girl Scouts Wisconsin Southeast. The 2014‐15 FLL competition began in August 2014 with 400 Wisconsin regional teams. At the regional competition, they won the Champion's Award (highest award) which advanced them to the sectional competitions comprising of 96 teams. LOL again received the Champion's Award at their sectional, which advanced the team to the Wisconsin State Championship. The top 36 teams in Wisconsin came together to compete in February. Team LOL once again won the competition with their third Champion's Award and advanced to the World Championship which expect to have approximately 30,000 people in attendance from 45 countries,

The girls, 5 members of Our Redeemer Lutheran School and one member of Grace Christian Academy, can be recognized by their brightly-colored hats and energetic pre-competition dance to their team song, Live Out Loud, by Steven Curtis Chapman. Not only does this song match the acronym of the team (LOL), but it sets the stage for how the team approaches the day, and every day, by living their dreams and pursuing them passionately. Team LOL enjoys finding many expressions of fun by linking words to the letters of their team name. Of the many acronyms found this season, some of their favorites include Lots Of Lego, Learning Other Languages, Love Our Lord, and Laugh Out Loud. Members are Emma and Janelle Johnson of Elm Grove; Aleksey Hicks, Lauren Parsons and Natalie Wessels of Wauwatosa; and Rebecca Gatewood of Waukesha. Mentors are Jessica Gatewood and Hannah Willer. Coaches are Eric Johnson, Julie Wessel, Mark Willer and Brent Gatewood.

Visit LOL's webpage at http://fllteamlol.weebly.com/ Instagram’s fllteamlol

FLL Challenge: Overview and History
In early fall, FLL releases a Challenge, which is based on a real‐world scientific topic. Each Challenge has three parts: the Robot Game, the Project, and the FLL Core Values. Teams of up to ten children, with at least one adult coach (two coaches required in U.S./Canada), participate in the Challenge by programming an autonomous robot to score points on a themed playing field (Robot Game), developing a solution to a problem they have identified (Project), all guided by the FLL Core Values. Teams may then attend an official tournament, hosted by one of our FIRST LEGO League Partners. Past Challenges have been based on topics such as nanotechnology, climate, quality of life for the handicapped population, and transportation. By designing our Challenges around such topics, participants are exposed to potential career paths within a chosen Challenge topic, in addition to solidifying the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) principles that naturally come from participating in the program. Team members also learn valuable life and employment skills which will benefit them no matter which career path they choose. - See more at: http://www.firstlegoleague.org/challenge/thechallenge#sthash.PBoAURmA.dpuf