Moving up or Moving on?

[Simon Strauss]

Now that the 2006 season is officialy over and a lot of power is changing hands within all the teams administrations and leadership i just wanted to create an opportunity for all of us on CD to inform each other on who is moving up in a team and who is moving on, whether it be a team change or an end to your time in FIRST. Feel free to congratulate each other and let me start it off by informing you all that i have gained the position of assistant Capitan for team 1155 along with username JoelP for the 2007 season and our junior year.

[JamesBrown]

I will be giving up my posistion as captain on 1568 to become a college mentor for one of the RPI teams, either 20 or 1493.

[lukevanoort]

I might end up giving up my position as Captain of 587 to join 900. (I'm on the waiting list for NCSSM) Then again, I might stay the same, you never know.

[Jay Trzaskos]

I have decided not to move on to Clarkson a year early and plan on finishing out my Senior year, and my 6th year on 229, at Massena Central High School. I am moving on, in a sense, to mentor 4 FLL teams along with one FVC team.

JT
229

[pyroslev]

Unsure at this point. There is 1610 coming back next year, 616 is 90% confirmed provided issues are resolved and possible another team through the community college that is offering to help 1610 and 616. Ifall the teams get in a row, that will put three teams at one facility I can mentor.

The problem is that I'll be transferring fall of 2007 but that's later. For now, I can probably look forward to mentoring three teams through next year's build season.

[Rickertsen2]

I, along with the rest of the 1139 leadership will be graduating this year. We will try to stay on as college mentors. Most of us are going to college locally.

[spears312]

I'm assuming student control of Heatwave next year, but I'm already getting a taste of the huge responsibility its going to be.

[sanddrag]

I have moved up to the role of Contstruction Co-Chair for the Cal Poly Pomona Rose Float Committee. Basically, it is the ultimate responsibility of me and one other guy to build this float for the 2007 parade. Our duties include the design and fabrication of animation mechanisms, engine repair and maintainance, structure design and fabrication, and crew compartment design and fabrication. There is a lot of welding, plasma cutting, and torching involved. It is a very laborious process. Lately, I've been spending every Saturday from 9AM until 7:30 PM on it, and the parade is still over half a year away. It is a year round process. While my participation in FIRST will lessen, it will never cease.

[MikeJ675]

As I'm moving across the country soon, I'll be a 675 alumni in the near future, and I've been talking to Hiteak about mentoring 1930 once I get to RIT, which is as close to 100% going to happen as possible from my current position.

[Jeremiah Johnson]

I'm going to community college in the fall. So my involvement will lessen a tad bit... or more. I am though... looking to start a VEX team here in the QC.

[Donut]

I will be continuing as President of our team for 1 more year, and actually get to run the club from the beginning this time (I became the new President halfway through the year after some organizational issues). Other than me we have all new officers for next year.

We currently have at least 1 teacher sponsor for next year (we're once again losing the current teacher sponsor), and there's a very good chance we could get as many as 3 for next year (so we're guranteed to have a team next year). This group seems to be easily the most interested ones I've seen while I've been part of the team and I think could bring back the level of teacher involvement we saw when Mr. Mineri started the team 6 years ago.

I'm exicted about next year for our team.

[Nuttyman54]

I'll be graduating from 971 (though I will keep in touch) and moving on to be a college member of Team 190 (Gompei and the HERD).

[Michael Corsetto]

I'll be moving up to become team co-captain. I am sharing the role of team captain with Adam (114gopher). I think that having myself, a more robot focused team member, and Adam, a more team logistics member, working together will result in an effective and comprehesive leadership team. Sometimes, when you have a soley mechanical team member become team captain, they can neglect or forget the fact that they have to oversee the team as a whole, not just the robot. This is just as true for the opposite. A captain who has no experience with the robot probably won't know how to run the team effectivley throughout the build season. There needs to be a balance, and I believe a co-captaincy was a great decision for this coming year. Can't wait till January!

Mike C.

[ScoutingNerd175]

I am moving on from team 175. This is a necessity, as I will be going to college 5 hours away. I am, however, planning on keeping my name for the foreseeable future. I don't know what else I would be. I will be majoring in Engineering and may work with team 174 next year. It sort of depends on what I can handle. We hope that some day Syracuse University will have it's own robotics team. However, it may be a while. FIRST is the reason that I am going to be an engineer. I hope to be a part of FIRST for a long time.

[Kyle Love]

I hope to return as The TechnoKats student lead and continue as driver for one more season. Hopefully I can take what I learned this year and apply towards next year.

I would like to thank our lead teacher, Mr. Chris Byam, for his 10 years of great support and comic relief. EVERYONE on The TechnoKats and FIRST will greatly miss him not being at the competitions. Thank you for all you have done!

[dubious elise]

I'm very sad to say that I am moving on from FIRST. It's kind of messy right now (PM me if you really want to know) but I simply am not allowed to continue to participate in any way while I am in college and, hopefully, medical school.

I will never forget the good times I've had, the invaluable lessons I've learned, and the amazing people I have met in these last three years.

At least I am proud to say that my team is in good hands next year, whether the new leaders believe that they are ready to accept their positions or not :)

[Pat Fairbank]

I'm not sure yet what I'll be doing next year. I'll be starting college for real over in Ontario in the fall, (as opposed to the strange Quebec post-high-school phenomenon known as CEGEP), but I'll be on a Co-op employment term next Jan-April.

So if the job takes me back to Montreal, I'll continue my work with 296; otherwise, I'll take whatever FIRST involvement I can where I end up.

[Rick TYler]

I might as well post this here in this handy-dandy thread.

I hope to announce later this month that my employer has provided a generous grant to start a new FIRST team here in King County. Unlike most teams, we would be a club team, chartered through the Explorers program (like fire or search and rescue Exploring programs), and hosted by my employer. We would be starting with three experienced mentors and three student members, and would have our first organizational meeting before summer.

Our new team doesn't have a number yet, of course, and won't have a name until we have some more students to give it one. Team Top Gun will motor on at Eastlake High under the other four mentors of the team. For the time being, my sons and I are still part of 1294, but as we get the new team running we will not participate in Top Gun any longer.

We are planning to focus recruiting on schools that don't have FIRST programs within their schools, and promote FIRST at middle and elementary schools. It's an exciting opportunity to spread FIRST in King County outside of the schools, and to (eventually and hopefully) act as a resource and mentor to new high school programs in the area.

Wish me luck. With our experienced cadre and the support of other western Washington teams (like 1318, 488, 1294, and 492) we hope that we will be a top tier rookie team next year.

[kateisgreat145]

it reall stinks that the seniors ar moving on next year. all of our seniors on the team have been really great as im sure it is on most teams. so what me and another kid decided to do was what we call "senior goodbyes". sports teams might know this, you get all the kids to write little blurbs about each person jokes things you'll mis exc and we put them in a book and are going to give them to the seniors at the last meeting. we do it for swimming and it's always a nice way to say goodbe/thanks/we'll miss you