February 24, 2026 — A group of ten students from five different Cobb elementary schools collaborated to win a state championship in the 2025-2026 FIRST® LEGO® League (FLL) Challenge! The team, called Brick Storm (FLL Team 71595), rose to the top among more than 4,000 students and 470 teams statewide to earn the opportunity to represent Georgia at the World Championship in Houston, Texas, in late April. The FLL Challenge is a global STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) program for students ages 4-16.
Under the guidance of their coaches, Ms. Yuan Zhuang and Ms. Jane Yang, the team devoted a tremendous amount of time to collaborative learning and problem-solving. They met regularly for three hours each Saturday and held Zoom meetings as needed. Beyond these group meetings, each team member also dedicated significant time to individual research and study.
The team was organized by the Penguin Brothers Robotics Club in East Cobb. Most team members participated in a robotics summer camp or other extracurricular activities at the Club. Their work for the FLL Challenge included studying archaeological sites, researching archaeological technologies, designing educational board games to teach archaeology concepts to the public, performing robot missions, visiting archaeological museums, and much more. Through these activities, the students developed creativity, persistence, teamwork, and mutual respect—while learning how to apply STEM skills to help improve the world around them.
Their hard work has been consistently rewarded. The team won the Robot Best Performance Award at the regional tournament held at Walton High School on December 6, 2025. They earned both the Robot Best Performance Award and the Champion’s Award at the super-regional tournament held at Wheeler High School on January 17, 2026. Winning the Champion’s Award advanced the team to the Georgia State Championship at Georgia Tech on Feb. 7, where 60 top teams competed for two Champion’s 1st Place Awards and the opportunity to advance to the World Championship.
At Georgia Tech, Brick Storm exceeded all expectations. They won the Robot Performance 2nd Place Award and the Champion’s 1st Place Award, becoming one of only two teams selected to represent Georgia at the FIRST LEGO League World Championship, April 29-May 2, in Houston. They will compete against top teams from more than 60 countries.
"This achievement is truly exceptional," said Jianfeng Jiang, proud parent of East Side Elementary student Boyan Jiang. "We are incredibly proud of these young students and want to celebrate their dedication, teamwork, and success!"
The 5th grader reflected on how the season shaped his perspective.
"Being on the team changed my perspective on archaeology. I learned a lot about archaeology and the past," Boyan said. "For my robot attachment, I changed it multiple times and added a rubber band to hold it together. I also designed the board for our board game, 'ArchaeoQuest.' Overall, this experience taught me that everything pays off in the end."
Boyan's team members are listed below, along with comments on their experience participating in the FLL Challenge (students listed alphabetically by first name).
Alexander Sun, Mt. Bethel Elementary School (4th Grade):
"At first, I didn’t like FLL because my team and I had to do mountains and mountains of work. We had to create and memorize scripts, code tremendously difficult codes, build efficient attachments, and make a complicated board game. That was not fun. But soon, after the first tournament, I noticed hard work paying off. After loads of more hard work, in the State Championships, we won first place overall in tournament A. That is hard work paying off again."
Carrie Chen, Mt. Bethel Elementary School (4th Grade):
"The thing that was hard was the amount of homework we had. I came into the team because I had done the summer camp; it was really fun and my coach encouraged me to come. We had to research so much and it was hard to do while also trying to manage other things. When we went to our first competition, we realized how all our hard work and time paid off. After that, when we went to the Super Regionals competition. We felt way more confident and were able to win Super Regional Champion. Lastly, when we went to state, we weren't expecting anything big, but we won state champion! My experience showed me that if you work hard and put effort and time in, you will succeed."
Edward Tang, Mt. Bethel Elementary School (4th Grade):
"At the beginning, I did not like it. We had a pile of homework taller than Mt. Everest. But when we won the first tournament, I started liking it. My partner, Krithik, and I combined our robot attachments to reduce the changing time. We worked together to add a multi-piece one-way door and made several adjustments to make sure that nothing was blocked by each other’s parts. For our innovative project, I researched historical sites and made the mission cards for ArcheoQuest. I learned that anything is possible if you work hard."
Eric Jiang, Mt. Bethel Elementary School (3rd Grade):
"I did not like the first few robotics practices. We had soooo much homework. We had to code, make our attachments, practice for 3 hours a week, and make a game. But after the first tournament, I began to like FLL. Also, I started to like the practices because I got to know everyone. I learned a lot about coding, archaeology, and building. In the second tournament, it went even better. We got 415 points in the robot run, which is really good. In state, we got 470 points, and we won!!! All the hard work paid off."
Ethan Zhou, Tritt Elementary School (5th Grade)
Janie Luo, Sope Creek Elementary School (4th Grade)
Krithik Tadimarri, Rocky Mount Elementary School (4th Grade):
"I was inspired to join robotics because of my older sister. I’ve always loved coding and building with Legos, so when I started looking for a team to join, my cousin told me he was joining the Brick Storm team. I decided to join, too. The first few days were challenging because there was so much to learn, but things became easier over time. We started with research and then brainstormed ideas for our innovation project. For the robot run, I chose Mission 9. I began with a passive attachment, and after several iterations, I built an active attachment with an extended arm to lift the market roof. I noticed that Edward and I were using similar extended‑arm designs and we decided to combine our ideas. In this journey, there are many people I want to thank for helping me reach the world competition. I’m grateful to my family and teammates for supporting me every step of the way. Most of all, I want to thank my coaches for guiding me, helping me improve, and always pointing me in the right direction."
Peter Alan Niculescu, Mt. Bethel Elementary School (4th Grade):
"This robotics season, I learned that when you work with a team, you have to be there for them, even when it is stressful or does not match your schedule. One time, I had to run from a climbing competition to the robotic meet to support my team, even though I was very tired. Also, I learned that when working on a large project, it is more efficient to split tasks to come up with ideas and then present results to the rest of the team for discussion. Finally, thanks to this project, I got interested in designing board games."
Rishaan Ranjan, Mt. Bethel Elementary School (5th Grade):
"At first, I was skeptical. I didn’t understand what our final goal for the Project was, or how in the world we were supposed to complete the missions. But slowly, I started to realize. We were to make a board game that informed the public about archaeology. When we each started picking portions of the board game, I immediately chose Game Rules, because I have always been fascinated with how games work. We were ecstatic that we won the Robot Performance Award, but we weren’t done yet. We were moving on to Super-Regionals. Ethan and I worked together to combine our Robot Runs. It required hours of work and going to our houses, but it gave us more reliability. We got First Place in Robot Performance and Overall. We were going to State! We put in more hours of focus and work, which got us first place at State. We are going to Worlds! The whole journey of our team brings new meaning to 'Where there’s a will, there’s a way.'"
Congratulations to these young engineers and game designers for their incredible work and research in archaeology! We can't wait to see how Brick Storm performs at the World Championships in a few months. Best of luck, Team Cobb!
Photos courtesy of Team Brick Storm
