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During a wrestling match at West Jordan High School on Wednesday, two opponents circled each other tentatively, careful not to move outside the ring.
When they connected moments later, one of the wrestlers was torn in half, then left broken and defeated on the floor.
"I want a rematch," West Jordan Middle School ninth-grader Joshua Herman said.
He scooped up his "wrestler," a Lego robot built for sumo-style competition, and moved outside the ring, working quickly to reattach the dislodged pieces.
"I should be able to get back into the competition here and be able to win a couple more times," he said.
Herman was one of roughly 100 students from three junior high schools who came together for the Jordan School District's STEM Academy Showcase on Wednesday.
The event was a culminating activity for a yearlong after-school program that featured hands-on learning for computer programing and robot design.
In addition to sumo wrestling, Wednesday's showcase featured robot tug-of-war and computer programs written by students in the STEM program, an acronym for science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
"This is their final product," Oquirrh Hills Middle School teacher Carly Sterland said. "This is what we worked for through the year."
The STEM Academy is a new program for Jordan School District, funded through a three-year $700,000 grant from the state's STEM Action Center and the Utah Department of Workforce Services.
The program served 180 students at three schools, who met twice a week for two hours throughout the school year, according to Barbara Gentry, a science and STEM consultant with the school district.
"Next year, we plan on doubling our number of students and having an advanced class as well as a beginner class," Gentry said.
Each robot at Wednesday's event was unique, from bulky creations with a low center of gravity to speedy designs with extra wheels, shovel scoops and propellers.
Wendy Hoang, a ninth-grade student at Oquirrh Hills Middle School, said she and her teammates had worked for two weeks on their robot, which used a color-recognition program to guide itself around the wrestling mat.
"We have a sensor right here, and when it senses the color black, it's been programmed to turn around," she said.
Her teammate Adam Evans, an eighth-grade student, said he enjoyed the hands-on nature of the STEM Academy. He's considered engineering as a career, but said he didn't join the after-school program solely for career preparation.
"I have thought about maybe doing something with robotics, but I don't know," he said. "I just wanted to have fun."
Sterland said the STEM Academy gives students more applied-learning opportunities than the standard middle school science class. She credited the success of the program to the STEM Action Center grant, which enabled the school district to purchase the robotics equipment and new computers.
"No class can afford to have a kit of $500 robots," she said.