I spent a grand total of about an hour knocking together this control panel for our EduRobot. It works just fine, and left a lot of time for working on other aspects of the robot (like figuring out how to put two pieces of beam back together when you cut one too short because you translated "measure twice, cut once" into "cut first, ask questions later"). It's small, it's compact, it's lightweight, and it doesn't cost very much (pegboard is real cheap!) and it doubles as a lunch tray when the pizza arrives...
-dave