AUSTIN, TX­—Govalle Elementary School student David Bocanegra will program a robot, which is made out of Legos, to be a guard dog at NIWeek in front of about 3,000 engineers, scientists and educators, alongside astronaut, engineer and former NFL player Leland Melvin.

What: Bocanegra, who is a part of the Govalle Golden Roadrunners For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST) LEGO League Robotics team, which was the first elementary-school team from the Eastside Memorial Vertical Team to enter the Central Texas First Lego League competition, will program a robot in front of a live audience.

When: 8:30 a.m. Thursday, Aug. 8

Where: Austin Convention Center, 500 E. Cesar Chavez St.

Background: Following the presentation, NI will present the FIRST showcase, to reveal the next-generation, embedded robotics controller code-named Athena that FIRST will begin using in 2015. FIRST Robotics Competition teams from across Texas will attend the session, and Don Bossi, president of FIRST will discuss the new controller.

NIWeek is National Instrument’s annual conference for engineers and scientists with more than 250 interactive technical sessions. The LEGO Mindstorms Education EV3 platform (named EV for evolution) is the third generation of LEGO Education robotics technology designed for classroom use. The intuitive software platform for EV3 is based on National Instruments LabVIEW graphical programming software.

The live stream of the keynote presentation will be available at ni.com/niweek/livestream. The FIRST Athena showcase will be live streamed at ni.com/first.

For press credentials to attend the keynote, please contact Beth Williams, media relations manager, National Instruments at beth.williams@ni.com or (512) 683-6394.