Dear forum community,
This is our third trip to world but our first time getting in on the design award interviews. Does anyone have any tips for my middle school students? They have their engineer notebook ready…any thing else? Thanks for helping me calm some nerves of both the kids and their teacher 
Calm down. “Judges aren’t scary people. You’ll be surprised how much you can tell them about your robot.” I believe VEX said so, and according to my experience this statement is valid.
Bring on some enthusiasm and professionality. Show how much you love robotics and how much you know about the situation. If your engineering notebook allows, present your robot according to the documentation and then explain your design process. Engineering notebook is a large portion, the hard proof, and of you nailed that, more than likely you are fine. So relax and enjoy the moment other people understand and comment on your robot. It doesn’t happen everywhere else than judges’ interview!
Don’t be too uptight, my team always gives the judges a few inside jokes from the team, and has a good couple of laughs with he judges. The more relaxed and calm you appear the better. It makes you sound more confident about your robot, and more comfortable talking about it, which shows you know about the design well enough to not be worried about having it looked at and questions asked about the design process.