80 teams from Israel and abroad participated in the "Robotrafic 2017" competition named after the late Nadav Shoham.
On Thursday, about a thousand students participated in the Nadav Shoham Robotrafic competition. Eighty teams from schools in Israel, the United States, Argentina, Mexico, Russia and Ukraine participated in the competition, which was held at the Technion. Sonia Katiheva, a XNUMXth grade student at the Ort Odessa school, said that her group developed a system that is installed in the car and informs the police about exceeding the speed limit. Jorge Becker from Mexico said that he is connected to Israel and that "the competition is an excellent opportunity to visit Israel and the Technion and have the great experience of Robotrapik."
The senior vice president of the Technion, Prof. Adam Schwartz, said that "Ultimately, the most important resource in the State of Israel is the human resource, which is why the Technion invests so much in the younger generation. The purpose of the competition is to increase the involvement of teenagers in the field of robotics, which is becoming more and more integrated into our lives."
In preparation for the competition, the participating groups are required to design, assemble and program small autonomous car-like robots, which are required to drive in accordance with traffic laws. This is the eighth year of the existence of the competition, which is now named after the late Nadav Shoham, an engineer and master's degree student in the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering at the Technion who was killed in a snowstorm in Nepal in 2014. Nadav's father and the founder of the competition, Prof. Moshe Shoham, who heads the Robotics Laboratory at the Technion, said Because the widespread participation in the competition is very exciting and he added that "the era of autonomous cars is closer than we think, and it will allow us to efficiently use the travel time to and from work."
The Robotics competition is organized by the Leumi Robotics Center at the Technion, the World ORT network, the organization "WORLD ORT KADIMA MADA" and the World Zionist Organization in cooperation with the Ministry of Education, YTEK and Eytam Robotics. Shmuel Cohen, director of pedagogical programs in the World ORT Kadima Mada network, said that "Robotrafic is a competition made in Israel, in which students from all over the world participate - a fact that is in line with our striving to strengthen the relationship with Diaspora Judaism. The purpose of the competition is to give students knowledge and skill in both robotics and safe driving. This is through smart roads that contain sensors that provide information to the autonomous vehicle."
Prof. Zvi Schiller, head of the Israeli Robotics Association, told about the late Nadav Shoham: "Nadav was a rare combination of wisdom, generosity and modesty. He taught us that it is possible to be excellent and humble at the same time. He was present at Robotrafic competitions and was very interested in them."
Haim Dribin, a national instructor for robotics at the Ministry of Education, said that the competition started eight years ago with only five teams, and gradually grew to the current situation, with eighty teams from Israel and abroad.
Doron Gutman, representative of National Instruments, said that "Our goal is to inspire you and train you to be the inventors of tomorrow."
The competition is led by Dr. Yevgeni Kurchanoi, director of the Leumi Robotics Center at the Technion.
In the competition between the elementary schools, the Shmarit Netanya school won the first places (in the overall summary, race and Robotrafic project categories), and the Adam and Sabiva Geash school won the Robotrafic youth prize. In the competition between the upper divisions, the first places were won by Ort Odessa (comprehensive competition and race) and Kiryat Ganim Rishon Lezion (Robotrafic project). The Innovation Award was won by Beit Hanina Technological Science High School. In the competition between the top divisions, Ort Odessa (careful driving), Tomsk Russia (advanced careful driving, Miro and road safety initiatives), Ort Moscow (SolidWORKS), Ort Kyiv and Meshgav school (test in driving rules) won the first places.
