FIRST LEGO League Cyprus 2026-2027 (BIOGLOW)

This is the last one. FIRST® LEGO® League as the island has known it for a decade ends with the BIOGLOW™ season, and the Cyprus national event on 20–21 March 2027 at the European University Cyprus in Nicosia is the final edition before the programme is replaced. Registration closes 10 January 2027 — roughly two months before the competition, and non-negotiable, because teams have to be shipped equipment first. Who runs it. The Cyprus Computer Society (CCS), in collaboration with EDUACT, which holds the FIRST® LEGO® League franchise for Greece, Cyprus, Bulgaria and the Balkans. The four programme options this season. FIRST and LEGO Education have split the programme into two parallel editions during the transition, so Cyprus is fielding all four:

• Founders Explore (ages 5–9) — runs on existing SPIKE™ Essential and LEGO WeDO 2.0 kits.
• Founders Challenge (ages 10–16) — runs on SPIKE™ Prime, EV3 and Mindstorms.
• Future Ages 5–8 — runs on the new LEGO® Education Computer Science & AI 5+ equipment.
• Future Ages 9–16 — runs on LEGO® Education Computer Science & AI, with the Informatics 11+ set.

Important, and the organisers say so explicitly: only two of those four are competitions. Founders Explore and Future Ages 5–8 are described in the announcement as non-competitive festivals — every team presents to judges and receives certificates of distinction, but nobody is ranked. The competitive events are Founders Challenge and Future Ages 9–16, where teams are ranked, winners progress, and the work splits into a Robot Game (autonomous missions on a themed mat) and a judged Innovation Project. Team rules differ by edition.

• Founders Challenge: 2–10 children, ages 10–16, one team per table, autonomous robot missions, no devices at the game table, wired motors and sensors.
• Future Ages 9–16: 2–6 children, ages 9–16, four defined roles per team applied during the competition, two teams per table with collaborative scoring on some missions, half-size mats, wireless motors and sensors, and device use at the table is mandatory.

The theme. BIOGLOW™, under the FIRST CANOPY™ umbrella: ecosystems and biodiversity — how nature, technology and innovation connect. Teams research a real-world problem in that space, then design, build and programme a LEGO robot for the mission table. Cost. €150 per team for Founders Explore and Future Ages 5–8. €350 per team for Founders Challenge and Future Ages 9–16. The fee covers the equipment set, lesson plans, the engineering manual, coach training sessions, rulebooks and judging rubrics, entry to the event, and certificates or medals. The timetable as published.

• 15 October 2026 – 10 January 2027: announcement, coach and team registration, subscription payment, and dispatch of equipment and access to teaching material.
• 12 September 2026: coach briefing session, held at European University Cyprus (already past).
• 10 January 2027: registration absolutely closes.
• Further coach training sessions: dates to be announced.
• 20–21 March 2027: the national event, European University Cyprus.

And then abroad. CCS has committed to sending at least one team to a global FIRST competition this season. The reference point is the 2027 FIRST Championship in Houston, USA, 28 April – 1 May 2027. The announcement is blunt about the money: travel costs for international events must be covered by the teams and parents themselves, and if CCS secures any funding from the Research and Innovation Foundation (IdEK/RIF) it will be shared among the travelling teams on the Foundation's terms. Why the deadline matters more than usual this year. The transition is not cosmetic. The Discover programme has been scrapped as of this season. Founders Edition is retired in June 2027, after which only Future Edition continues, and LEGO Education launches a different league programme in August 2027. A child who misses the 10 January window does not simply wait a year for the same thing — the thing itself changes. How to enter. Coaches register on the organisation's website, create players, form a team, assign players to it, enrol the team in one of the four programmes, and pay through the site; CCS then arranges equipment dispatch. The registration system sends automated status emails, so the organisers advise whitelisting info@ccs.org.cy and firstlegoleague@ccs.org.cy and checking spam folders. Contact. Christina Papamiltiadou, 22460680, c_papamiltiadou@ccs.org.cy. Format note: start and end clock times above are nominal — the organisers have published the weekend of 20–21 March 2027 and the venue, but not a detailed hourly programme. Listed as a team competition on the strength of the Founders Challenge and Future Ages 9–16 divisions; the two younger programmes are festivals rather than contests.

Event website