On the 29th of September, Robogals UQ held the very first "Girls in Robotics Day" at the University of Queensland campus! It was a huge success, with girls attending from schools around Brisbane and the Gold Coast, in Grades 5-12!

The day started off with some interesting mind-puzzles to warm up the girls before they broke off into pairs to build their LEGO robots. A very important stage of the building process was dressing and decorating the robots. The robots that day had costumes made out of pipe cleaners, Lycra and other miscellaneous items.

Once the robots were appropriately dressed, they were required to complete the challenging task of assisting their Uncle Ramses to find the treasure in an ancient Egyptian tomb.

We had such talented girls that day—all of them completed the challenge! Some even started creating more tasks for themselves, exploring the use of touch and sound sensors on the NXT kits!

In addition to the robotics workshops, the girls attending had an excellent opportunity to talk to girls from other schools and also to Robogals over a 'Create-a-Cupcake' morning tea and the 'Robo-Lunch'. The Robo-Lunch saw a revival of Nabs (Lessons Manager) and my third-year project, 'The Micromouse' and some excellent Robo-Gator-NXT building from Marnie (Executive Committee member)! The girls also had a guest lecture from Ruth Schulz, a researcher at UQ, who gave an extremely interesting presentation on talking robots! Some girls were so inspired—we overheard a lot of "I'm going to be an engineer" talk by the Grade 7 girls!

Of course, there were some fabulous prizes given to the girls, for best-dressed, best themed, best programmed, and most creative robots. The favourite of all the Robogals was "Lady-Eva" - A mix between Lady Gaga and Eva (from Wall-E)!

The day was such a success, that there will be another "Girls in Robotics Day" held in December! The theme for this day will, of course, be Christmas!