My Nonprofit Reviews

FIRST is amazing. The goal of FIRST is to inspire students in the areas of science, engineering, and technology. FIRST uses robot competitions to bring together students to work with engineers and other business people to design a build a robot to meet a challenging competition. I have the privilege of judging the teams in various aspects of team attributes and machine attributes. It is amazing to be able to walk into a group of high school students and ask them to explain complex mechanical designs and to feel the excitement as they relate to you incredible details about their robot, or how they manage their team, or their community outreach. One of my more memorable experiences occurred during the 2009 Championship in Atlanta. I was assigned several teams to interview for an award, one of the teams was from a facility for troubled youth. Students must earn their way onto the team and can only remain on the team if their behavior is exemplary. These students worked hard to build a robot and make it to first a regional competition in Colorado where they achieved the highest honor, the Chairman's Award. This award earned them a trip to the championship in Atlanta. The students on the team related how their FIRST robotics experience has changed their lives. One student plans to mentor other FIRST robotics teams in the area when he graduates.

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