HOUSTON () Thousands of high school students from around the world are competing at the FIRST Championship, a four-day robotics competition in Houston.

From Armenia to Australia, more than 15,000 students representing 17 countries are participating in the competition, which stands for For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology. They design, code and build complex robots from scratch to compete in intense challenges.

“We have to travel a long way to get here, which means we have to pack our robot all up in, like, a crate and send it multiple weeks before the actual competition,” said Ashley Nestlerode, driver for Australia’s Thunder Down Under robotics team.

Major companies such as NASA and Boeing also attend, scouting for the next generation of engineers.

The competition kicked off Thursday morning and will run through the weekend.

Competition challenges brightest youth

“The technology that’s used in building the robots is just so far beyond what it was,” said Collin Fultz, senior director of FIRST Championship, reflecting on how far the event has come since he competed more than 20 years ago.

This year’s challenge involves cleaning imaginary algae, represented by dodgeballs, scoring them into nets, and placing PVC pipe “coral” on a simulated reef.

“It’ll be three on the blue alliance against three robots on the red alliance,” Fultz explained. “At the end of the match, they climb and get their 150-pound robots hanging from this cage.”

When teams aren’t competing, they’re in the pits, tweaking and perfecting their robots for the next round.

Some teams chase goals greater than a trophy

For many students, the experience is about more than just competition.

“Having that robotics initiative and bringing the mission of FIRST to the reservation is why we’re on the Hall of Fame team right now,” said Elena Klopfenstein, of Coconino High School’s CocoNuts Robotics team in Flagstaff, Arizona.

Last year, the CocoNuts were inducted into the FIRST Hall of Fame after receiving the program’s highest honor, the FIRST World Championship Impact Award.