The Blanks, a group of sixth-graders from Robert Miller Elementary, returned from Atlanta last week after competing against 500 students from 74 different teams at the First Lego League World Festival.

"This was the experience of a lifetime," said Vivian Meiers, the Blanks' coach. "We may not have placed, but we were winners in sportsmanship, and we never gave up. They definitely learned the tenacity of a project by seeing it through to the end."

This year's First Lego League challenge, No Limits, required students to build and program robots that meet the specific needs of those who face physical challenges in their everyday life.

In January, the Blanks competed against 12 other teams from across the state to win the first-place trophy. At the national competition, the top 16 teams advanced to the final rounds after compiling their daily scores.

"We made some rookie mistakes, but they did everything they could to build a robot that was engineering-sound," Meiers said.

The students who were members of the Miller team are all in the levels of service-gifted and talented program.

They are: Todd Splonskowski, Cody Fried, Matthew Kessler, Christina Perleberg, Taylor Wrege, Alex Mantz and Andrew Roehl.

The team mentors were Bismarck State College engineering students Ted Wald, Curtis Reule, Brian Gross and Dave Peterson, and Bismarck High School student Ashton Wilson. The mentors came after school to help the Miller students program the robot and assist with engineering concepts.