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Do any schools recognize their FIRST teams as sports?
If our FIRST team was recognized as a sport we would get so much more from the school but they do not even want to consider it. All we want is a little more attention.
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Our *school* refers to our team as everything but a sport...positive and negitive...ive heard our team refered as "the smart kids of the school" but yet i have heard a student refer to us as "snobbish jerks".....i wonder how many teams get those responses...
Thats what I get for posting at 12:30am |
My high school team was refered to as "the nerd club" by just about everyone. We weren't recognized as anything but that.
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I wish my school considered our FIRST team a sport. I asked the athletic cordinator for the school if we could place any trophies or metals in the schools trophy room and he said no.:mad:
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trophies!
We have a ton of trophies and we have no where to put them.. there are all these trophie cases in our school and the one time we actually got them in one they were there for about a week then they gave the case to $@#$@#$@#$@# chorus.
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After we won New England Regionals we hung the banner in the gym, with all the other banners.. Of course, the sports teams, particularly the football team, rioted.. Guess what?? It's still there.. and if you look at the numbers, the next closest year next to a banner from a 99 winner for male sports( most of the trouble was the males, go fig..) is a whopping 1984..
Besides that, we get a small display to act as our trophy case.. And we rotate some trophies as the local libraries.. ::sigh:: We may not be a sport, but nuts to that, we deserve recognition!! |
Yea, people in our school tend to think of our FIRST team as an extremely exclusive club o' nerds. It kind of sucks but... This year is the first year you can get a letter for being in FIRST, so that's pretty cool! If you can get a letter for being a manager of the basketball team you should be able to letter in FIRST - look at how much more time is put in! :)
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the Team 25 FIRST shrine
At our school Raider Robotix has become well known and reasonably well recognized.
Yes, we are still known as the "nerd kids" but considering the enlightened source those comments come from it is hardly worth bothering with them. Anyway, we display our banners and trophies in what I fondly call "The FIRST Shrine" We have two 8 ft high display cases at the opening to the quad for our science wing and we simply took them over. The group made a backdrop of red and blue fabric and we plastered the walls of the display with photos and plans from each of the past six years' robots. Each year we put some spare part or remains of that season's robot to add to the collection and we use the glass of the case for posting notes to the public for dates and such. Among our most cherished trophies on display are a Buzz smiley face signed by the teams of the 2000 alliance, the remains of the first Mr. Volcano hat, the ball arm from our 99 robot Navarone which was a great idea poorly executed, and a ball from the 2000 Nationals signed by our California alliance partners. And, of course, each season when we get a new Hawaiian shirt design for the year we hang one in the case so our shirt sellers can show potential customers. Our school never received National acclaim for anything until we won in 2000 and at the time we were applying for Blue Ribbon School Status. It all came together at the right time and the team has enjoyed a lot of local recognition for it. Now if my advisor's club stipend was the same as the football coach's who works half the time for three times the money and less results...... Oh well, I'll have fun anyway... (PS_ see the shrine next November at The Brunswick Eruption- local FIRST mini competition at NBTHS) WC:cool: anything |
oh yeah....
And by the way- our sponsor Bristol Myers Squibb has a similar display case right in the lobby of their visitor's center fully stocked with trophies, apreciation plaques and photos from the team. It generates a lot of interest and has spawned several new teams from visiting potential sponsors.
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you guys are so lucky
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lucky- maybe
Hey Joe-
Maybe it's luck but you also need to realize that we have been around for 6 years and FIRST is a full time club with us. We've worked hard to get where we are today and look forward to an even better future. One way you might get more support from your school is to have your faculty advisor contact the local papers and let them in on your projects. I find that once the public sees great things happening in the school the administration has no choice but to recognize it and give support. Remember- most people never heard of FIRST. YOU tell them with enthusiasm and energy. Take lots of pictures. Make a press packet and send them out to the local newspapers. Rally the community behind the team. A part of our team is dedicated to just this job ( also helps with fund raising). Elected officials (like school boards) love to look good for the voters, especially if it costs them nothing. A word of caution- when dealing with the public ALWAYS keep a positive attitude and always credit your sponsors. Newspapers love to find controversy and they can ruin you as easily as help you. (This is a hard learned lesson from a guy who occasionally loses his cool- especially this year being on an ODD team) Good luck- and if we can help let us know at Team 25 WC |
Our school refers to it as an extracuricular activity, but not a sport. I guess a sport is something where you have to physicaly compete and exerting some type of activity (running, jumping, throwing, etc.) other than mooving the robot and a joystick. But out principal and super intendent recognises FIRST as something bigger than a sport.
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My school is nothing but trouble to my team.
Greg |
Our school had us listed as a club last year... but this year we are a "class." Yes, that's right, we get "Elective" credit for taking part in robotics. For what that's worth...
Don't even get me started on the whole sports-in-the-high-school thing. Yuck! (Can you tell I am *NOT* a sports person?) ;) |
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Anyhow, Wayne, we've been around 7 years as prettymuch a club. Despite the competitions we've won, and on 3 consecutive occasions, coming very close to taking the nationals, the school very rarely recognizes us. We at one time had a shop teacher, metals teacher, and the head of the Science Dept. working with us. We never got much attention. And it will be a while before we get the deserved attention. You are right; it's a moving process. Publicity is the major thing, and despite numerous attempts to educate non-FIRSTers about the competition, it very rarely does anything for us. You know what's sad? If someone from our school entered the Battlebots competition and got eliminated the first round, they'd probably get more attention than us. It's all a publicity thing. "It's really something when a FIRST team does much better than the football team." -forget who said that, but it's true I guess FIRST will remain "Middletown High School's best kept secret". |
Lots of sweat and and a marathon sprint to come!
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I don't know about your team, but I know that on our's, there sure is alot of sweat right about now with our design decisions just coming together now! Pretty soon, maybe week 3, we will start the marathon sprint down toward the finish line....and all while powered by Coffee, Gatorade and Twinkies! We have a playbook....we have offensive and defensive strategy. We have our team huddles, and we will even have team logos and uniforms. (Shirts) I see plenty of teamwork happening, and we are certainly out to win, even if we are a rookie team. It's not only like a sport, it is BETTER than a sport because things we learn working on a FIRST team can be used later on in our careers. (and I'm talking from the Engineer's perspective as well as about students! ) :D Keeing it real, -Quentin :rolleyes: |
What some people think
The one day i happened to ask my friend what he thought a robot was and he said one of those guys that walks around! I was like yeah true but that is only one of the types of robots. He thinks I am crazy to be in this (Robot) thing! Also many others do. At the end of the 6 weeks we usually have a show off day before we ship and its amazing that some teachers bring there students. yay I guess we are all NERDS I dont mind that! And no I don't want robotics to be considered a sport, after all do we do any physical activities besides operate all the machines and tools!
And lose tons of sleep! I just wish we got as much attention as all those sports teams do! Once in a while during the comps we get Robotics team mention that we placed ...... The thing that I do like alot is the teachers that allow me to get out of there classes because they believe in what I am doing I guess! |
Team members in our team (#448 - Crandroids) get full sorts credit for the Robotics team. I guess that is because the school requires you to be involved in sports constantly and clubs don't count for sport credit. And it is impossible to be on both the robotics team and a sports tem at once - FIRST is just too time-consuming. Another non-sport that is sport credit given for here is Acting.
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Earlier one of my teammates responded to this thread stating that many see FIRST as a club o nerds at our school. However i think that is what it is seen as more now than in years past. I know the earlier years i was in it, it was seen more as a time consuming club, where many people understood the physical and mental demands to be a part of the team, and they knew it wasnt for them. Now, this is my fourth and final year as a student member of my team, and over the years i believe FIRST is as much a sport as any other one. I believe this becasue i was a four year starter on our football team and i know what kind of work goes into a sport as physically and mentally demanding as that. And when i think and compare the two, i think FIRST equals or exceeds the demands of such a sport, and any other sports and in my mind it is the ultimate sport requiring more willpower and commitment than anything else out there. no sport asks you to sacrifice 6 weeks plus of time, often 5 hours a day or more, and even to pull all nighters to get the job done. I know no other sport that you can work or practice or build for 24 hours straight, and you make yourself do it cuz you know it needs to be done. No other sport has ever asked me to be there till 6 am, come back at 7am and work till 5 pm, and i do it because of the challenge and because i believe in it, thats what makes it a sport in my mind. To do that takes more physical and mental strength than any other sport out there. so if someone can tell me that all it takes is brains and to be a nerd to be in FIRST, tell me why some football player who is just as much a sport guy as the next, says FIRST is probably the biggest and best SPORT out there. The qoute says a lot too)
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"You know what's sad? If someone from our school entered the Battlebots competition and got eliminated the first round, they'd probably get more attention than us. It's all a publicity thing."
I am a freshman in my school. I built a battlebot that competed in the most recent battlebots competition (November) and got eliminated in the first round. I wanted to try to start a first team when I got to high school and learned that a teacher was already getting it done so I joined. I am still asked without provoking anyone about battlebots (over two months after the competition), and yet not even once have I heard anyone ask or talk about FIRST. (although if we actually had an established team that could show off a completed robot it might be different) |
Closet Thing To It...
Hey,
At my school, this is the closest thing you get to sports. My school is one of those specialized schools, and we are prohibited from having sports teams, because our students come from different area's all over our county. Where if they are playing for us, their home school is losing out on maybe a good sports player. My schools trophy case has many trophies and ribbons, but all of them are from chess, or TSA, or other academic temas. If you want competition that is as thirlling as a sport, you come to use. We arent considered the nerds, we are considered actually the guys who like to work on cars, and maybe arent as smart as some of the otehr kids, but we can fix just about anything ;). I love my school. |
Re: trophies!
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Adding to my previous post...
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I would rather be in FIRST and regarded as a 'nerd' or whatever than get a ton of recognition from my classmates for being the star of a sports team. I understand that FIRST is for me and sports are for others - too bad the converse is rarely understood. (Then of course there are the cool people that belong to both sports teams AND FIRST!!) - Katie :) |
Labels
On the subject of labels aimed at a team, like the nerd club and such: The name of our team is the Sie-H2o-Bots pronounced See-Hoe-Bots, and I have heard it called it the Psycho-Bots which I pesonally take in stride. Then again I am a mentor on the team and not a student but considering how many of last years graduates that were on the team who recieved scholarships, awards or other benefits compared to the school's sport playing student graduates - Then I'm all for being Psycho!!!!
Also I'll throw in my favorite quote here on the Robotics-Sports issue. "Hey, If cheerleading is considered a sport; then Robotics should be considered a sport. End of discussion!" |
My school just sees us as a club, and personally i think robotics is better then sports. That is why i left the football team to join our team here.Oh and about display cases? I Belive we have never had an award in our school from our team. People here don't call us geeks or nerds....they call us computer freaks:D
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kinda
our school recoginize as not a club but kinda a sport. in our school we have to be reconginized as a sport it has to be a club for a certian amount of years then it will be recoginized as a sport.
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in my school, EVERYONE knows the students in first (the main ones), but its referred to as a club, not a sport. we are referred to as the smart kids, but not at geeks.
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The fact that our school prides it's self in it's technial program and the fact that our team consists of athelites or ex-athlites, me being an ex-football player has earned a considerable level of considration among faculty and administration. however we are still looked at as nerds, geeks, and snobs by coaches and other studens. We defend ourselves by asking them if they could build a fuly functional robot in 6 weeks. to this the most common responce is "get lost nerd". Yeah we may be nerds but I will take that over being a jock any day. :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:
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Somehow I doubt that its just lack of recognition that keeps schools from recognizing their FIRST teams. Our team has been around for many many years, won tons of awards and are still given almsot no recognition by the school. There seem to be two reasons for this. The first is the administration and staff are actually emotionally attached to our sports teams. When the football team does well, we hear about it for weeks. We could win nationals and still go completely unrecognized, because they just dont care about a bunch of geeks and their robot. The second reason is money. If they recognized us as a sport and not just a club, we would have a footing to lobby for funding like the football and basketball teams do. At our school, football is so a big deal, they get all their uniforms, equipment and transportation paid for. 1% of their total budget would probably pay for us to go to nationals.
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Could it be that part of the lack of recognition is because school administrators and/or school boards don't want to be seen as "supporting" the corporate sponsors that most of our teams have? I don't know if this is a factor, but I think it might be in some cases.
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Kit may be right
To a great degree Kit may be right about schools not wanting to endorse corporate sponsors. But supporting a student team and having a sponsor do the same is sometimes acceptable.
In our first two years our team was facing a school board which was fanatic about not having any kind of corporate logos anywhere on school grounds. As a result we somewhat played down the sponsors at the school and played it up in the community. And each year, after our season was through we would send a Thankyou letter to the Board spelling out all of the support we had received from the sponsor and community, the $10K in Autodesk software the district got for free and the successes the students had. I think part of what changed their tune was a series of letters the Board received congratulating the team on the progressive nature of the team and applauding our BMS partnership. One of these letters came from the Governor's office and State Dept. of Ed. in response to a student's letter to the Governor (believe me- it surprised us too!). Nobody talks about restricting sponsorship these days. School Boards and Administrations listen to outspoken parents. FIRST students have parents. Maybe the two should should meet. Have faith- eventually your schools will come around, especially when they see the sponsorship funds helping out. OK- back down from the soapbox... WC |
Re: lucky- maybe
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We've done all that and we still have gotten no school recognition. We even had a demo at a board of education meeting. We've had a series in the newspaper about us. ANd nothin |
It's nice to know that other schools have had the same experience we had. Although we were able to display some trophys in a small case in each school, there was no real recognition, until...
We invited the principal of one school to chaperone in Florida one year and invited the principal of our other school to come and see the Midwest Regional. Each person was given a team t-shirt and made part of the team. You have to admit anyone who comes to a regional or national event is hooked. Now we have banners up in each school, public demonstrations during school events, participate in awards recognitions, special awards for seniors at graduation. Of course we now have the support of principals, assistants and teachers as well as some incredible support from our school district and school board board members, local government and parents all of whom are coming out to cheer us on. We have worked with the school district and now have classroom credit for participating in FIRST (as a two semester activity) Keep trying and be patient, invite your principal to competitions especially so they are there for the finals and awards ceremonies. It is during those times that the true meaning of FIRST comes out as we congratulate all those receiving trophys and awards. Good Luck Al |
have a little faith in your future!!
Hey Ogre-
It's too bad to hear that your school isn't coming through for you. Al is definitely right in getting the administration involved in the team. These guys get all kinds of requests from "clubs", usually wanting favors and money with little in return. I'll bet most of them have no idea what FIRST is about. How about showing them one of the FIRST videos if you can't get them out to the competition itself? We just got a new principal last Monday and already he has a team shirt, an invitation to the Regional and has spoken to the newspapers for an article this week. He will support us whether he likes it or not!! (just kidding). His first comment was "gee- it sounds like that Florida trip needs a principal to chaperone." As the teacher end of this thing let me say that I understand very well why teachers can get fed up with doing this. We (aka I)ALMOST quit in the fall of 1999 for lack of serious committment from the powers that be. Our successful 2000 season made all the difference and it was a lesson for me. All I can say is hang in there and keep working to develop your team. Your team's success will come eventually from YOUR efforts. FIRST is worth the effort, isn't it? If there is anything we can do to help feel free to ask. WC |
Often the robotics team
We usually get refered to as robotics guys. We did not get a lot of attention cause we usually work after school and at weakends. I guess that the way life goes:) .
Regards schitnis Team 915 |
Well, our team has a lot of schools, but here's how my school recognizes our team.
We get a float in the homecoming parade. We are allowed to have fundraisers. We get an assembly. We get mentioned on the announcements. We are not a physical sport, we are a "competitive event in the field of robotics." It's pretty cool that we do get some fame at our school. Everybody keeps asking if we're going to build a Battlebot. |
Sport.......ha ha ha
My high school is known for their sports teams, both boys and girls sports alike, but our FIRST robotics team will never get the school wide apprication of a jock. Our school board travels with us and Administrators follow the program from kick off to phone calls during compeitions. Our FIRST program has a "class" in which we get credit for and all team members are encouraged to take it to get more fimilar with the parts and how they work each year. Lettering in FIRST........that seem ok, considering that you can letter for band (which I won't crack on because I'm in band) and Speech and Debate (which once again I won't crack on). I should talk to someone about that!! HUmmm........interesting!!
Our robotics team is a popular club to be involved in. Your either on the team or wanna join the team, but everyone is welcome to the team. We do have a few titles as many of the other teams have, but the jocks have their nick names and the Cheerleaders have their nick names as well, so I guess it all comes with the territory. Shelley ...... |
!After winning the regionals in hartford. The school I goto regonized us at a sports rally that we had. So I tihnk they consider us a sports team.
Well off to robotics and finishing prototyping and working on the awesome website!! check it out www.qhs.gillette.com GO TEAM 69!!!!!!! |
Team537 has the totally backing of the Sussex School district here in Southeastern WI. The students last year (rookie year) all earned varsity letters. The same is true of the students who are working this year (once they meet all their requirements :) We also devised an implemented a summer class that ran for 3 hours a day for 3 1/2 weeks (GE engineers worked in 1 1/2 hour shifts, the class was basically run by the TAs (FIRST team members from last year)) and we are currently working on a year long FIRST/robot/science application class to implement starting next year. Getting Administrative buy-in is key to the success of any FIRST team!
We are currently working on getting the same level of support at Mukwonago HS for team 930. We're slowly whittling away the resistance "Persistance prevails where all else fails!" Having an open house and pep-rally certainly help the cause, by getting alot of parent buy-in and understanding of the program. Last year Sussex Hamilton hosted an open house that was attended by 3 other WI-FIRST teams (93, 269. and 706) and it was a huge success! We're doing it again this year (Saturday before ship!) 16feb2002, and we'll see who can show up. It's a nice date to work towards! |
Tou eanna hear somthing really funny ? In the past four seasons our football team has only won 3 games!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :) :) :) :) :p :p :p :p
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We are barely recognized at my school. Barely anyone who doesn't know a team member has actually heard about us. We try to get our name out, but my school is a lot of the sort of people who could care less what a group of "nerds" do. I think maybe our name is a little more well-known at SFHS (the other school that makes up our team) b/c that's where our captain goes to school as well as where he team is really based at. I think the fact that we have our building there makes the South Fork kids realize we at least exist. I think there we're actually listed as a team and our advisor gets a suppliment. The only teach from my school active is my father and he doesn't want to deal with the all of the junk you gotta deal with if you're a club. We would never be listed as a sport, I know that for certain. Our athletic director is cool and all, but it's not something he would do. As for a trophy case..we have very few and we dont' really care about having them displayed. I think Pratt & Whitney may display awards from us and our sister team (179) but I dunno. It's almost nice that not too too many people know about us so we can just kinda be left alone to do our thing...but that's just my personal opinion..
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No offence Stack! lol |
Does it matter?
I'm not sure how people define being recognized as a sport. Nor am I sure it is importent. Our team is getting a lot of support from the school. We have several teachers involved - two of them are also parents of team members so does that still count? The administration and others have helped us get funding and resources. We're really not lacking for much in the way of support. Well, ok, it would be nice if the lead teacher involved got paid what the football coach did.:eek:
Sports teams get to wear game jerseys on the day of or before a game. I guess we'll know where we stand when I ask if we get to wear our shirts the day before we leave for regionals. ;) On the other hand we may be bringing our cheerleaders. They've already attended math meets BTW. They don't just support the jocks at our school.That's what I mean about not having to be a sport to be supported. |
Taking the Principal to a reginal sounds like a very good idea. I will bring it up at our next meeting. Very good idea indeed...
BTW, we don't have any tropies to display yet, but those of you going to VCU and Nats watch out for Team 116! Fair warning. ;) |
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