Right now, over 3,300 high school and community teams are assembling（聚集）around the world in anticipation of the upcoming season of the FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) Robotics Competition, which will begin an intense eight weeks of designing, building, and programming new devices in January.

In two-and-half minute matches, robots compete in groups of 3-vs-3 on a volleyball-sized playing area. Each match starts with fifteen seconds of autonomous action, when robots are programmed to score points on their own. Then, behind a plexi shield（有机防护罩）, the humans step up to control their devices, and it's on-speed, power, grace, defense, teamwork, showboating and the occasional collision with bits of plastic and metal flying around.

Robotics competitions are nothing new, but over the last few years, the FIRST Robotics Competition has developed from a fascinating after-school activity to having a real impact on the tech and engineering world. Demand for workers in fields like automation and connectivity, against recent declines in engineering college graduates, makes a recover, showing multiple years of hands-on high school robotics increasingly desirable in corporate America. "We like to see evidence of project-based learning, working in teams, hands-on experience and that sense of discovery," says Jennifer Cluett, head of admissions at Worcester Polytechnic Institute.

A who's-who list of FIRST sponsors-including Coca Cola, Amazon, Apple and Disney -shows how eager big businesses are to prime the pipeline. "Traditionally we would look very heavily at a college GPA（平均分）. But increasingly companies are looking for more well-rounded employees," says Jody Howard, vice president of innovation and emerging technology at Caterpillar Inc. "What's so interesting about FIRST is that, while they may be coming out with robotic or programming skills, it's really the teaming and problem-solving that make them stand out."