FIRST College Edition?
 

In reading the many posts about concerns of FIRST alumni, I came up with the idea that, if FIRST can run a high school level and a middle/elementary school level competition, could it then run a college level competition. I really haven't fleshed out the whole concept yet (i.e. cost, rules, etc.), but I was wondering what people's reactions to such a concept would be. The one downside that I can think of, is that it would take away a portion of the mentor pool, as college students would be busy working on their own robots instead of high school level robots. Any thoughts?

The main selling point of scollarships is for kids to go to local collages so they can mentor their home teams. A collage comp would ruin the mentor pool that FIRST relies upon. But think about this, the college FIRST is to mentor another FIRST team.

If a student is in college studying engineering or science, then FIRST has already acheived its goal for that person.

FIRST was started by Dean Kamen & Woody Flowers, back when Dr Flowers was already doing something similar in one of his mechanical engineering classes at MIT.

the MIT students were required to build a robot to compete in a table top game as part of the course. It was so popular that it was shown on NOVA with Alan Alda back in the 80's (how many remember seeing those? the games with the pingpong balls?)

many universities already participate in enginnering contests much more challenging that FIRST - they have race car competitions (RIT has won the world championship) - off road vehicle competitions, flying machine contests - all kinds of stuff.

Once you get to college you will look back at FIRST and think its kids stuff. :c)

You had a great idea - proven by the fact that its already being done - but done on a much higher level!

I have given this quite a bit of thought over the last couple of years, and it's my opinion that a college-level FIRST competion would be great.

The only concern I had -- as you expressed -- would be that it might retract college mentors from high school FIRST teams.

However, I think this concern is quite easily addressed by holding the college level competition during a different time of the year, for example in the fall semester.

Now, I do not think it is necessary to have FIRST sponsor this competition. It's great to have a central body like FIRST do it, but FIRST is geared towards inspiring youth to pursue science & technology. A college level competition would basically inspire college students to keep at what they are already doing. This is a good thing, but I'm not sure it's what FIRST and Dean Kamen have in mind.

I actually think College sponsored High School FIRST teams are problematic by nature, except in rare circumstances. I think a college-level competition would help let the college students have their fun and use their brains during their competition; and during the high school FIRST competition, act as mentors and not try to finish off that winning design they never could quite obtain on their high school team.

EDIT: If there were a new competition, please name it something other than FIRST. That name has given me so many headaches and taken away so many hours of my life explaining that it is an acronym and we are not the first robotics team to exist.

- Patrick

As much as I miss the driving and fun of being a high school student, there is something great to be learned from being a mentor as a college student. If I think about it really, its equally, if not more, valuable to partake in a team on a mentor level.

If I had the choice, I'd stick with mentoring the kids.

As was mentioned, many colleges have other things (solar car racing, concrete canoe, etc) and competitions for college students. You could even start, say, a battlebots club at your school. But mentoring is the second half of this great learning experience for those of us lucky enough to have the opportunity to do both. Dean's homework for seniors of going to college and starting teams isn't just for the benefit of those seniors, which is all a college program will do.

Like I said, I miss the high school parts of the program just as a much as anyone.. but I wouldn't give up working with our kids for it. I was given the opportunity, and I want to give that back to others.

Just my opinion as to why there shouldn't be a FIRST 'college edition'.

It is true there are competitions at a much higher level, for example here at Cornell, we have Moonbuggy, Autonomous Submarine, Robocup (robotic soccer), HEV (Hybrid electric vehicle), FSAE Racecar, autonomous space vehicle lander, and several more I can't remember the names of. All these are great projects to be involved in, but most are hard to get into until your Junior or Senior year in college (or even a masters program)... Simply because you do not have the engineering background during your first two years to contribute to the teams. Our teams require applications and interviews to get on the teams, and it is very rare to get on a team as a freshman.

I think a FIRST college competition would be a great supplement to introductory and sophomore-level engineering classes. There are so many of these basics that can be applied to a FIRST college competition, such as gear ratios, stress and failure analysis, basic programming, etc... After the sophomore year, I'd recommend trying to get involved with some of the more complex projects at your college.

-Patrick

I know there are several college level robotics competitions...

2 college mentors from our team and a former one are currently competeting in the ROBOT RIVALS competition on TECH TV. Its a competition where colleges send kids to compete with robots that they build the day of in a junkyard like junkyard wars and with the help of an expert (ie junkyard wars) they build a robot that does a certain task (again like junkyard wars)

I believe they have they are filming the finals of the show the week after nats which the team from purdue is competeting in.

There is also a group of people who have been in first or were first mentor or are first mentors at purdue that have a BattleBots team, which i believe some of them are getting college credit for.

The oppertunities are out there, you just have to look for them.

While there are other college level competitions that are difficult, I'm not sure if they are exactly more challenging than FIRST. The key difference is that they are different than FIRST. One of the big parts of FIRST is that it's key part is mentorship. At the college level it's much harder for that to happen. When you have college students mentoring high school students, I think that that's probably just as challening as college students working on a Formula 1 team by themselves.

What does it mean that RIT's won both the world championship in Formula 1 and FIRST? ;)

Matt

In your first two years of engineeing at college, you will study calculus, chemistry, physics, intro programming, english and other non-tech courses.

In most universities you dont get to touch a wire or transistor until your junior year, or a gear, motor...

you spend the first two years building a foundation of science, then you start taking the more interesting courses.

Thats why most college competitions are for juniors and seniors.

But getting back to FIRST - the only reason you have engineers and teachers, and corporate leaders giving their personal time and money to be mentors in FIRST - is to get you INTO college - not to give you a crash course in engineering, or to teach you how to design a stack wacking machine.

I dont think you will find many mentors willing to give up this kind of personal time and energy for something like FIRST at the college level. Thats what we pay the colleges for - to teach you that stuff when you get there. And they already do an excellent job of it.

FIRST is sucessful because we bridge the gap between highschool freshman math and your first year of college. FIRST shows you there is an incredibly light at the end of the tunnel. Say in high school, stick it out, work hard, get into a good college - and you will make it the rest of the way on your own.

FIRST:Playing with robots, Altering the future!

I have actually thought of having like a FIRST after FIRST. I mentor my team still, but I still wanna be able to build a robot and show it off, but build it for myself or with other alumni that miss it too.

Mehhh.... Just pick a robotics field and go for it. There is bound to be a competition on it. Lets see if I can remeber the college/non first competitions.
Beam robotics competitions
Sumo competitions
Flying robotics
Soccer games
Trinity Firefighting
Rov competitions
Vacuum robotics
Robot combat
Personally trinity firefighting is probably your best bet as it is a really big competition worldwide.

what about simply letting the college kids drive?

Because it's a high school competition and should be focused on high school students.

Matt

I second the opinion of letting college kids drive!!
We are members of the team too you know


P.S. I know that this will never happen

I was a member of our teams drive crew for 3 seasons. in 2000 i was the human player and in 2001 and 2002 i was the driver. boy do i miss it, but its time for the other kids to get a chance to drive so that they can experience what i did. i still go the the very bottom so i can be right on the field while the rest of my team sits way high in the stands. i LOVE to hear the crashing metal and parts flying off :]

FIRST is about getting individuals in to engineering or science, so us alumni should go out and start new teams rather than new leagues for us to play in.

Ya but it's just so much fun. I help out teams all the time so its not like we not doing what we are suppose to. maybe start a league thats off season from FIRST??? FIRST Alumni Competition??? just throwing stuff out there

Lol, the high school competition is hard enough!!! Stop giving them ideas ;)

Can't give it up
 

I suppose you all are right, that a FIRST college edition is not such a hot idea. I guess my problem is that I'm living in some sort of FIRST Neverland. Or maybe I'm inadvertently about to become the Van Wilder of robotics?

Nick, get some friends who are also in FIRST that go to the same college and start a new team. I have learned so much by being a mentor, it really is a wonderful thing =)