134 - Team Discovery

FIRST is a unique experience. Picture a NASCAR team and all the things involved. There is fund raising, a business plan, marketing, designing, public relations, fabrication, technical support, team apparel, strategy, driving, a pit crew, and scouting teams. But unlike NASCAR where you know what the challenge is, FIRST is different. On the first weekend in January the team will find out what this year’s game will be. Then we have 6 weeks to design, build, test, program, learn how to operate this year’s robot, and ship. During this time the majority of the marketing happens and we need to build a mock playing field to test out the robot. The games can involve balls, chin-up bars, goals, rolling platforms, pillows, tetrahedrals, storage boxes, teeter totters, inner tubes – we can only guess what it will be this year. As you can imagine or may have already experienced with us, it is pretty intense to accomplish all of this in six weeks. We meet at least 3 afternoon/evenings a week and both Saturdays and Sundays during the build season.

What makes us so successful is that we are not only a team of students but a team of students and mentors. These mentors are community members, parents, engineers, and college professors. We invite any interested adult, including post grads to show up and help at any time. Mentors do not need have an engineering background just a desire to help with the effort. The same is true with student team members. No special skills or knowledge are needed to join.

(from http://www.sau53.org/net9/First/about.htm)