An invasion of robots hit Central Nebraska this weekend... all in the name of learning.

24 teams from across Nebraska, Iowa and Kansas, competed this weekend in the VEX Robotics Tournament in Aurora. It's a world and national qualifying competition where students build and control their own robots. Eighth grader Benjamin Johnson competed in the tournament and he says, even this early, he sees the value in the skills that they learn.

"The whole engineering part is important. Like when you are going to college, colleges will look at you going through this program and if you want to get a job in engineering this is a big this because everyone knows about this. All the companies do," said Johnson.

Johnson says not only are they gaining technical and programming knowledge, they also learn to work as a team and develop good sportsmanship. The National Championship will be held March 7th through 9th in Ralston, Nebraska.