As you will be aware, the COVID-19 situation is quickly evolving, having recently been declared a pandemic. Many large events are being cancelled and we want to be public about how we are responding to the latest news.

We currently intend to have the competition on the 18th and 19th April 2020 as planned, however are actively and carefully considering whether this needs to change. We will be contacting teams about our decision next week. We will also publish this on the Student Robotics website.

To improve transparency about the situation and what Student Robotics is doing, we’ve created a COVID-19 updates page.

If you or your school has any questions about our handling of the event, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

We’re pleased to announce this year’s Competition dates and the first Tech Days of 2020.

Competition Dates

The Student Robotics 2020 Competition will be held at Reading University on the 18th and 19th of April 2020.

These two days mark the ultimate stage of SR2020, showcasing the months of preparation. Our teams will work hard to push their robots to the limit and quickly make repairs between league matches. We will finish the weekend with the finals where the best bots will be named victorious.

As usual, we will require attendees to fill out a media consent form.

For more information, please see the Competition event page.

We hope to see all the teams and their robots at the Competition!

Tech Days

Tech Days are opportunities for teams to spend a whole day working on their robot with lots of help available. They’re also an opportunity to see how other teams are doing or get more direct help with their robots.

We provide a space for teams to work in, with power and internet access, as well as volunteers able to help with the kits and hands-on guidance for the robots.

We have now confirmed the dates of some of the Tech Days in 2020. These will be in Thread’s offices at 1 Alie Street in London, on the following Saturdays next year:

• 25 January 2020
• 29 February 2020
• 28 March 2020

The London Tech Days will only run if there is sufficient interest, so please do let us know if you’d like to attend. The deadlines for each are the Wednesday 10 days ahead of the event.

Sign up to attend a Tech Day

We expect to confirm more Tech Days at other venues early in the New Year.

Student Robotics 2020 was Kickstarted today simultaneously in three locations – Cambridge, London and Southampton. Twenty-nine of the thirty-seven entered teams attended in person and it was great to see the teams getting familiar with the kits.

Our game this year, Two Colours, challenges teams to score points by retrieving coloured tokens from on and around a raised platform in the centre of the arena. They must place these tokens within their scoring zone (i.e. their corner of the arena). However, if a team gathers more than one token colour within their scoring zone, each token’s value drops from 3 points to 1 point. Full details, including the prizes available this year, are available in the rulebook.

This year’s teams have already been strategising their approach, and we can’t wait to see their progress over the year!

All competitors should now have user accounts for our website. This includes our IDE where teams can write their code, and our forums which are a great place to brainstorm with other teams and discuss any problems you run into.

(See our docs if you are not able to log in.)

If you weren’t able to attend Kickstart this year, or would like a recap, you can:

• watch our livestream where we explain the game and how this year’s competition will work.
• download the presentation in which we explain this year’s game and how the competition is running this year.
• download the microgames which are small activities designed to let you become familiar with the Student Robotics kit.