A GLOBAL engineering competition will be coming to Carlisle for the first time giving youngsters the chance to show off their Lego building skills.

There is expected to be close to 100 children at the University of Cumbria’s Fusehill Street campus in Carlisle all taking part.

Winners of the event will go through to the UK final.

The young engineers taking part have spent the last term working in their schools alongside visiting STEM ambassadors and figures from local businesses to design, build and programme their robots, and create an innovative solution to a real-world problem. The robots will compete in a series of games and the pupils will be judged on design and their innovation projects. They will also face an interview about the competition’s core values.

They have to demonstrate to judges their skills in robotics, teamwork, problem-solving and communication, as well as the contest’s core values.

Pete Woolaghan, from REACT Foundation, said: “When we started, Cumbria was the only region of the country without a team in the competition.

“At the end of last season, we had 67 teams and we’re now the biggest region in the country – Cumbria can be rightly proud of that.”