RIO RANCHO, N.M. (KRQE) – A team of New Mexican students made a name for themselves in the world of robotics after finishing second in a regional tournament in Dallas, TX. Story continues below News: New Mexico woman who killed 2 in wrong-way crash sentenced to life in prison Crime: FBI offers reward for information on gunman who killed ABQ tattoo shop owner Travel: Albuquerque International Sunport offering flights to Angel Fire Community: Albuquerque man looks to inspire kids facing homelessness "These are skills they're going to take outside of the competition," said Bob Gruenig, a mentor of the R4Creating organization, which competed in the tournament. R4Creating is a program aimed at teaching children all things math, science, technology, and engineering. It grew from humble beginnings as a garage start-up in 2005, to a program that impacts thousands of kids across the metro. "My favorite part is probably just the community and being able to fundraise and do presentations," said Skylar, one of the kids part of R4Creating. "I just love to have a challenge and try and figure out how we can accomplish that," said Cheyenne, who is also a member of the group. This year, a team of eight students from the organization took on schools across New Mexico and Texas; in a battle to see who could build the best robot, have the best presentation, and create an informative engineering book. They called themselves the "Rio Rancho Community Team". "It's really shown me that I love engineering and being able to solve a problem and find the most efficient solution for something," said Andrew, another member of the organization. A total of 73 teams competed in the tournament with the Rio Rancho Community Team taking second place overall. "When you get to the end of the season you can see how much they've grown, and they see how much they've grown, and they come back more excited next year," Gruenig added. One of the members of the team, Autumn, has been part of the organization for six years now. For her, it's the public speaking and presentation part of the competition that she enjoys most and said it's been helpful in honing those skills. "I got a lot more confident through that and I just decided that going past my comfort zone was a good thing and that I should present more to get me more," Autumn said. Though she still has some time until she graduates from high school, Autumn said the skills she's learned through the group will help propel her into a successful career. "There's so many skills and values that I've learned here, like hard work, collaboration, all of these things are all adding up to a future career in teaching," Autumn explained. In addition to placing second overall, the team also placed first in exhibit design and construction, and third for software design.