6.270 ("six-two-seventy") is a hands-on, learn-by-doing robotics course for MIT students run entirely by volunteer student organizers. Participants in the course work in teams of three and receive a kit of parts at the beginning of January from which they must design and build an autonomous robot. Three and a half weeks later, those fifty-five robots compete at the annual 6.270 contest, one of MIT's most popular events. (excerpted from http://web.mit.edu/6.270/)