help with FIRST paper [Archive]

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wonsi88

08-04-2005, 08:34

Arefin Bari

08-04-2005, 08:45

A lot of students decribe FIRST as the best thing that happened to their life. Once a student gets hooked, they don't want to leave FIRST for any cause. I am one of them.

... My name is Arefin Bari, I am in my senior year, from SigmaC@t 108.

p.s. - I would suggest to post your essay in this thread after you are done with it. Maybe we all can help you make it a very solid one.

Sakura141

08-04-2005, 11:15

FIRST is a great thing for those in it, even if it does kinda take over your life. I can guarantee that I will either come back to mentor my team or start one to change more lives. I like to say that FIRST is my antidrug when some kids at my highschool want me to smoke. I say that FIRST keeps me away from that and getting into trouble. My grades have also been better then ever since when I started

Debbie Zwiers from Team 141, the Wo-Bot

Ashley Christine

08-04-2005, 14:15

Heres what I have to say...

FIRST is not like anything I have ever experienced before. There is so much to it, education, opportunities, teamwork and friendship. FIRST is like a sport, but without the rivalries. I have only been involved with FIRST for 4 months, and I already know that it is something that I want to be a part of as long as I possibly can.

It's so nice because there are so many people who are here for you, and they are people that you can relate to because we all have one thing in common. We love FIRST.

-Ashley Cheney from Team 1559, Devil-Tech.

P.S. If you need anything else then private message me.

Alaina

08-04-2005, 14:26

I feel that the only friends I have ever had are people I know through FIRST. Being on a team gave me the sense of belonging that I thought I didn't even need. FIRST has given me a great life that I never thought I would have.

-Alaina Hernandez; Captain, team 814 The Megaforce Squadron.

Sarah Johnson

08-04-2005, 15:16

Hi wonsi88,

If you are looking for some really great quotes to put in your paper, I think you could find some specific examples to support your thesis from the white paper under Misc entitled FIRST Testimonials. I looked it over, and there are many students who state why they are or were in the past, invovled with FIRST.

There are some awesome quotes which would support joining FIRST for education, experience, opportunity, and overall self value, as you stated. All the information on who the people are, etc. is listed after their first person accounts and experiences. I am sure if you look around some more you could find other white papers under misc as well with these kind of documents. I think they could help you a lot. You could also pick and choose which quotes you think would best support the points you are trying to make.

Good Luck on your essay!
I am sure it will turn out fantastic,

Sarah
--> If you want to go directly to the white paper, here it is: http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/papers.php?s=&action=single&paperid=389

1086Programmer

08-04-2005, 15:21

Just as an example for expirences...

When I joined our FIRST team at Deep Run High School, I just expected to be part of another club. Over the following months, I learned it was a little more than that. During build, and after competition, I realized, the Robotics team isn't just a club, it's a family. At least, that's my expirience.

Sara Bailey, 1086

RoboMom

08-04-2005, 15:24

dmurdz

08-04-2005, 16:03

The two most essential things that I have learned this year in first:

1. We are a Robotics Team and the bonds and friendships we have made over our experiences are one of a kind.

2. FIRST is a ton of fun.

Good Luck on the Essay, by the way, great topic too!

-Dan Murdzia, Team #1027 THE Mechatronic Maniacs, West Springfield, MA

wonsi88

29-04-2005, 14:39

thanks for the help i will be posting my paper soon

katiyeh07

29-04-2005, 15:13

FIRST improves your social skills. I know it has for me.

tiffany34990

29-04-2005, 16:12

i've written a lot about FIRST in my artist statements...pm me and i can give them to you....

FIRST to me is another "world" -- people that strive for the best and succeed...nothings stops us from achieving our dreams and while we go after our dreams we learn so much by working hands on, talking to mentors and friends. FIRST is just simply a great "family" to be apart of. This is one family that you can't help love being in and stay apart of.

I've learned so much and know why i'm learning the various things in math, physics and other classes. Through my 6 years in FIRST i've gained more confidence in myself. And met some of the greatest people of the years to.

and like arefin said..post it..we'll give you feedback.

Al Skierkiewicz

29-04-2005, 17:34

hey, I'm writing a paper for my English class about telling people reasons to join first. Ive narrowed the reasons down to education, experience, opportunity, and overall self value. so if u have any comments that i could add to my paper post in with in with your comment, name and team number. or if you know any resources that might help me out, please tell me. thanks
Russ,
From my standpoint joining FIRST is/was simply is the right thing to do. The program allows us to help students find themselves, make life choices and have fun doing so. It (and I as mentor) care nothing for your gender, religious beliefs, geographic origins, social status or finances. If you are here, in FIRST, I must help you along the way, answer your questions, give you strategy hints, act Graciously Professional, applaud your successes and be sensitive to your failures. I must help you to be all you want to be, even if you don't know what you want. Isn't a great series of reasons?

team1102a

02-05-2005, 13:03

There are a number of links on the first website

Try
http://www.memagazine.org/backissues/june02/features/teamwork/teamwork.html

This is the best quote I ever saw....

Steve Sanghi, President and CEO of Microchip Technology Inc., is a strong supporter of FIRST Organization (For Innovation and Recognition of Science and Technology) and sums up his sentiments about the educational organization as such:

FIRST isn’t just about building robots, it’s about developing life skills. The kids learn about developing relationship skills and responsibility through teamwork, finance skills through fundraising and budgeting, and project management skills through meeting timelines. On their own level, the students are actually creating a business and they mustlearn to present themselves and their organization with knowledge and pride.

The end product might be a functioning robot, but it’s not just about the technology. The real lessons are learned in the process of designing, trouble-shooting, and problem-solving to achieve the final goal as one entity. The success is in the teamwork, the relationships, and the experience, not just in the results of the competition. The partnership between academia, the community and local industry, and the support of the students, is what will build our future employees and our future citizens.

Daniel Brim

02-05-2005, 13:06

...FIRST Organization (For Innovation and Recognition of Science and Technology)Are we talking abot the same FIRST? The I in first stands for inspiration. But innovation leads to inspiration. I should stop before I get myself confused :)

-Daniel

petek

02-05-2005, 14:16

Besides the testimonials that Sarah mentioned (Rich Kressly put this together) go to the FIRST site and look at the evaluation summary which has some statistics, although they are old. FIRST is finishing a major evaluation of the programs, but I don't think the numbers are available yet for the public.
FIRST has now posted the report from Brandeis University on the FRC. (http://www.usfirst.org/about/impact.htm) From the Executive Summary:
In 2002, FIRST contracted with Brandeis University to conduct an evaluation of the FIRST Robotics Competition. The goal of the evaluation was to begin to address three basic questions:
- What is the impact of the FIRST Robotics Competition on program participants in terms of academic and career trajectories?
- What can we learn about the implementation of FIRST in schools, both in terms of better understanding program impact and identifying “best practices”?
- What kinds of impact has participation in FIRST had on participating schools and partnering organizations? This is a veritable goldmine of information and attributable third-party data which shows that, however you measure it, FIRST is very successful. I've been working with this report for a talk I'll be giving later this month at MARM 2005 (http://www.marmacs.org) and found it to be a great resource for statistics and participant feedback nuggets. (Yes, I plan to post the talk as a whitepaper once it's done.)

sudeepr71

03-05-2005, 22:51

hi
i'm writing a paper too. i need help on a fitting comparison for FIRST. any ideas?

thanks
sudeep

dhitchco

04-05-2005, 09:40

Sudeep,

here's a thought for your paper. It's actually very difficult to directly compare FIRST to anything else. It's really very different than building a SoapBox Derby cart, very different than solving a business problem in a corporation, and very different from everyday life at school.

Think of it this way. This year's game was built upon four-sided tetrahedrons. Try the following four topics in your paper:

1) Teamwork. How was the FIRST experience like any other project in terms of building teamwork?
2) The actual task of building a robot in 6 weeks. How was the FIRST experience like anything else you have done with such constraints over time, money, and talent?
3) Professionalism. How has the FIRST experience helped you to become more professional and yet still have fun. That part gets lost in the real world much of the time.
4) Community. How has the experience of FIRST expanded your own network of people? Has your circle of life become larger through the FIRST experience?