ALVA, Okla. – After 24 years of competition at Northwestern Oklahoma State University in Alva, the final Heartland BEST Robotics contest will send three teams to the BEST Regional Championships in Wichita, Kansas, Dec. 4-5.
Burlington High School’s robotics team won the BEST Award at the Heartland BEST Robotics contest at Northwestern Oklahoma State University. The team also placed second in the Robot Game competition, was the winner of the Founder’s Award for Creative Design, and won the Most Photogenic Robot award. This marks Burlington’s sixth consecutive trip to the regional championship in Wichita, Kansas, Dec. 4-5. Dr. Jenny Sattler (left) made the presentations.Advancing in the “Byte to Bite” competition are Burlington High School, winner of the top BEST Award and runner-up in the Robot Game; Lawton Academy of Arts & Sciences, which placed first in the Robot Game and second in the BEST Award competition; and Arnett High School, which placed third in the BEST Award competition and fourth in the Robot Game.
Lawton Academy of Arts and Sciences placed first at the Heartland BEST Robotics competition in the Robotics Game Award contest at Northwestern Oklahoma State University. The team also placed second in the top BEST Award category. These victories helped to qualify the team for the regional championship contest in Wichita, Kansas, Dec. 4-5. Lawton also won awards for Most Elegant Robot, Best Spirit and Sportsmanship, and Favorite BEST Digital Video. Dr. Jenny Sattler (left) made the presentations.Alva Robotics, which placed third in the Robot Game and was the highest-finishing team in that category not otherwise advancing, qualified for the regional contest but relinquished its spot to Arnett because of its small team size and a scheduling conflict.
This is Burlington’s sixth consecutive trip to the regional competition and Arnett’s second consecutive trip.
Arnett High School (foreground) placed third in the overall BEST Award and fourth in the Robot Game section at Northwestern Oklahoma State University. The team advances to the BEST Regional Championship in Wichita, Kansas, Dec. 4-5. Arnett also won the BEST T-Shirt Award. Alva Robotics (background), which placed third in the Robot Game category and qualified for regional competition, relinquished its spot to Arnett.
These teams will compete against other teams from Colorado, Kansas, Ohio, Pennsylvania and South Dakota.
In the future, to qualify for a regional BEST contest, Oklahoma teams will be able to compete in Kansas or Texas because no hubs will remain in Oklahoma.
The BEST Award, locally and at regionals, is the most prestigious award given at the contests. It combines five components: robot performance, engineering notebook, marketing presentation, team poster and interview, and a digital marketing video. The weighted average scores determine the overall winners.
All advancing teams can also compete for special awards like T-shirt design, most photogenic robot, or the Founders Award for Creative Design.
Each team was given an identical kit of parts at the kickoff event in Alva on Sept. 5. The teams then had eight weeks to design, build and test a robot before the game day contest.
This year’s game theme is titled “Byte to Bite” and has robots completing tasks in automated food production. The robots gather ingredients to build a BEST meal, transport the meal to the scoring areas, irrigate the garden, deploy the crop-tending drone and autonomously deliver the completed meal to the dining room.
Charles Martin, Robotics Team Coach at Persimmon Creek in Sharon-Mutual, is the winner of the 2026 Coach of the Year Award presented at the awards ceremony at the Heartland BEST Robotics Competition at Northwestern Oklahoma State University. Dr. Jenny Sattler (left) made the presentations.List of Winners:
A breakdown of all awards from the Heartland BEST 2026 competition is as follows:
BEST Award: first, Burlington; second, Lawton Academy; third, Arnett; fourth, Noble High School.
Robot Game Award: first, Lawton Academy; second, Burlington; third, Alva Robotics; fourth, Arnett.
BEST Coach of the Year: Charles Martin, Persimmon Creek from Sharon-Mutual.
Special Awards: Founders Award for Creative Design, Burlington; Most Robust Robot, Alva; Most Photogenic Robot, Burlington; Most Elegant Robot, Lawton Academy.
Best T-shirt Award: (as voted by the teams) Arnett
BEST Spirit and Sportsmanship Award: Lawton Academy
Favorite BEST Digital Video Award: Lawton Academy
Heartland BEST Steering Committee
Three Northwestern faculty members serve as BEST co-directors, including Dr. Tim Maharry, chair of the Mathematics and Computer Science department and professor of mathematics, who also serves as the head of sponsorship and finance and the BEST Award; Dr. Mary Riegel, professor of mathematics, who also serves as the game committee chair; and Dr. Jenny Sattler, chair of the Department of Natural Science and professor of physics, who also serves as the kit committee chair.
Others on the committee include other Northwestern faculty, Alva community members and the families of committee members, including Dr. Roxie James, dean of faculty; Dr. Keenan Meeker, assistant professor of mathematics; Dr. Rasika Mohottige, assistant professor of physics; Dr. Jason Wickham, professor of chemistry; Dr. Christina Xan, assistant professor of English; and Dave Riegel, Sandy Riegel, Dena Riegel, and Kalynn Samples.
More Information:
More information is available from Maharry at 580-327-8583 or tjmaharry@nwosu.edu or at www.nwosu.edu/natural-science/heartland-best. Photos from the contest may be found on the Northwestern Flickr page at www.flickr.com/photos/nwosu-rangers/albums.
More information about the Department of Math and Computer Science can be found at www.nwosu.edu/math-and-computer-science.
More information about the Department of Natural Science can be found at www.nwosu.edu/natural-science.
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