More than 165 high-school students from throughout Florida will compete in the fourth annual USF Poly RoboBattle February 4, 10 a.m. – 6:30 p.m. The event is free and open to the public. Contestants include the Smoke and Mirrors team, which includes members from Lakeland, that won the world championship in 2010.

The RoboBattle is a FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) Tech Challenge regional qualifying competition.  The event helps students learn to design and build robots with both radio- and autonomous-controlled behavior using the TETRIX robotic design system. Student teams develop robots that can perform the tasks defined in the Challenge, and then compete with, and against, other teams in qualifying competitions and a state championship. The USF Poly RoboBattle is the last qualifying competition before the state championship.

“The FIRST Tech Challenge lets high-school students experience the fun and excitement of complex problem solving in a positive and supportive team environment,” says Dr. Rod Brame, program director of STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) education, and assistant professor of science education.

“It also helps them discover the excitement and rewards of science, technology, and engineering.”

Competing in the USF Poly RoboBattle will be 16 teams from Clearwater, Lakeland, Longwood, Miami, Palm Harbor, Riviera Beach, St. Petersburg, Tampa, and Winter Haven

For more information contact Christina Pixley at cpixley@poly.usf.edu or (863) 667-7741.

The Detroit Tigers will host their annual fantasy camp game on Saturday, January 21 at 10:00 a.m. at Joker Marchant Stadium. After spending the week training alongside Tigers greats, the campers will have the opportunity to showcase their talent and passion for the game on the field.  Participants scheduled to appear include: Willie Horton, Alan Trammell, Mickey Lolich, Frank Tanana, Larry Herndon, Jon Warden, Jim Price and more.

Admission to the game is free, but a suggested donation of $2 will be collected at the front gate for the Detroit Tigers Foundation of Florida, which benefits local youth sports organizations and local charities.

Tickets for Detroit Tigers Spring Training games are currently on sale. Tickets can be purchased at the Joker Marchant Stadium Box office, Monday-Friday 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Saturday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tickets can also be purchased online through the Detroit Tigers website at www.Tigers.com or by phone at (866) 66-TIGER (84437). Joker Marchant Stadium is located at 2301 Lakeland Hills Boulevard in Lakeland.  For more information, please contact the Tigers at (863) 686-8075.

The Horticulture Department at Florida Southern College will host a plant sale from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Jan. 28 that will feature rare “heritage” roses available nowhere else in the country. The sale, which is open to the public, will support the Department’s participation in a unique project to create a Heritage Rose District in Northern Manhattan, New York.

In addition to heritage roses, the plant sale will also offer orchids, landscape perennials and other plants. The sale will be held on a lot on the northeast corner of the FSC campus along McDonald Street. Parking is available in Lot F just south of the sale. The parking lot can only be accessed by turning north onto Harvard Road from Lake Hollingsworth Drive.

Many of the roses offered for sale have been grafted onto roots of Fortuniana roses and are not available elsewhere in the country. Others are of varieties seldom offered for sale.  Many are certified free of rose mosaic virus disease.

Proceeds from the plant sale will support the next round of the Department’s ongoing Heritage Rose District project in the spring. As part of FSC’s commitment to service learning, students and professors have been propagating roses and planting them in Manhattan.

Since October 2009, the FSC Horticulture Department has been working with the Heritage Rose Foundation and the Office of the Borough President of Manhattan to develop the Heritage Rose District of New York City. The District covers an area of northern Manhattan from Washington Heights through Harlem, and is the first of its kind in the country.

Created entirely with donated roses and volunteer labor, the district is a celebration of the historic and cultural roots of these neighborhoods, showcasing roses that grew there more than 75 years ago. To date, more than 500 heritage roses have been planted on more than 25 sites that include community gardens, cemeteries, historic properties, cultural institutions, and universities. The majority of the roses planted in the District are from the rose collection at Florida Southern College.

“This project accomplishes a number of things for us,” said Dr. Malcolm Manners, Professor of Citrus Science and coordinator of the project at FSC. “It’s a great way for them to do service learning, by providing a way to beautify some of New York’s poorer neighborhoods. And at the same time, it’s an integral part of their learning for future careers in horticulture.”

For more information about the Heritage Rose District, see www.heritagerosefoundation.org.

Weber Environmental Services, Inc. has been serving the Central Florida area since 1995 as a full service landscape management company dedicated to more than just cutting your grass!  We are committed, as a team, to customer satisfaction through knowledge, determination and exceptional skills.  Our experienced trained staff is ready to help you create and maintain a landscape maintenance program with courteous, reliable, convenient service for both commercial and residential customers. 

Our corporate office is centrally located in Winter Haven with a satellite office in Orlando and a full service 30 acre nursery in Haines City.  Our many services include lawn maintenance, lawn and ornamental pest control, landscape design and install, irrigation, tree services, hardscapes, aquascapes, and remediation projects.  We service everyone from small homeowners, HOA’s, industrial parks, medical facilities and schools to large commercial resorts such as the Omni Orlando Resort and The Wyndham Orlando Resort.  We have state of the art equipment, a fleet of 60 vehicles and our own maintenance shops to care for it all which increases our efficiency and provides our customers with cost effective landscape management.  

Weber Environmental Services, Inc. has a goal to provide value to our customers through quality work in landscaping and every service our company offers along with competitive pricing to meet your budgetary needs. 

Weber Environmental Services, Inc.

5935 State Road 542 W

Winter Haven, FL 33880

(863) 551-1820

http://www.WeberES.com

The Polk County Public Schools Hall of Fame is seeking nominations from the community.  Nominees should be individuals who attended a Polk County public school and made significant professional and career contributions in the arts, business, clergy, education, entertainment, government, law, military, media, medicine, science, sports or other fields.

The Hall of Fame was started in 1985 and has 99 members.  2011 inductees were Lakeland Mayor Gow Fields, U.S. Senator Kay Hagan, education official Ron Jeffries and law enforcement crime scene expert Edgar Pickett, Jr.

2012 inductees will be honored during a June event along with valedictorians and salutatorians from each high school’s graduating class of 2012.  New members inducted into the Hall of Fame will be announced in May.  The nomination deadline is Friday, February 24.  Contact the Polk County Public Schools Community Relations Department at (863) 534-0699 or visit www.polk-fl.net under the “Announcements” headline to learn how to nominate someone.

For profiles of the 99 members, visit http://www.polk-fl.net/community/recognitionprograms/halloffameinductees.htm.