The FIRST Tech Challenge Vietnam (FTC Vietnam) 2025 - 2026 season contest just took place on January 30-1-2, attracting about 40 teams from secondary and high schools across the country along with some international teams from the Philippines, Indonesia, Laos and UAE.
The tournament is organized according to the competition rules and unified evaluation criteria of FIRST Tech Challenge, creating conditions for high school students to participate in robotics competitions within international standards.
This year's season is the DECODE theme, requiring teams to design and operate robots to perform a complex series of tasks such as collecting, classifying artifacts, decoding display motifs on the court, arranging according to requirements and bringing robots to a safe area to optimize scores.
As a result, the FRITS team (FPT Hanoi High School) and GreenAms Robotics Team (Hanoi - Amsterdam High School for the Gifted) won the right to represent Vietnam to participate in the FIRST Championship - the FIRST World Championship expected to take place on April 29 - May 2 in the US with the participation of hundreds of teams from many countries and territories.
In addition to the two teams representing Vietnam at the world tournament, the organizers also awarded the first alliance prize to GreenAms Robotics Team and UFORCE (Dubai). The second prize belonged to the NMA - ThunderClaw alliance (Nhat Minh Academy, Da Nang) and FPT School Ha Nam, along with many other specialized awards such as Inspiration, Thinking, Connection, Spreading.
Having participated in FTC Vietnam twice, Nguyen Phuong Thao - a 12A4 student at Nguyen Gia Thieu High School (Hanoi) - a member of the STEAM Gia Thieu team, said that the exam questions given by the organizers this season are quite complex, requiring the teams to study carefully to build appropriate strategies. "However, this is also an interesting exam because it requires us not only to have robots operating smoothly but also to have sophisticated strategies and flexible improvisation skills to score points" - the female student said.
Nguyen Minh Khoi - a 12th grade student of Tin at the High School for Gifted Students (Hanoi) - shared: "FTC is an opportunity for students to access skills that are usually only learned at the university level, from programming, mechanics to team management and organizing community activities".
This is the third year FPT University has hosted FIRST Tech Challenge in Vietnam. According to the organizers, the maintenance of the tournament aims to create an additional robotics playground for high school students, helping them have the opportunity to access a technology competition environment according to international standards.
Mr. Nguyen Xuan Phong - Vice Rector of FPT University - said: "We consider technology as a key content in training, so we want students to have more opportunities to access, experience and apply technology through practical activities such as the robotics competition".
Mr. Phong added that, besides FIRST Tech Challenge, the school also coordinates to organize a number of other technology playgrounds for students, focusing on fields such as artificial intelligence and robotics.
