pic: The President meets MOE
 

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

Wow. That's really awesome! I'm assuming that the Secret Service went nuts and inspected the bot before hand, and had someone posted right behind the driver at all times?

That's really cool!

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

This is a GREAT shot!!!

Is a story on this running anywhere tomorrow?

Jacob

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

Ahem......"where are the President's safety glasses???"

Yeah, someone was going to say it eventually.

This is a really cool pic. Digging the Prez's tie, too. :)

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

There are a few others that I will post when thye get cleared. Several members of the official White House press corps were also in attendance, and are starting to post their own photos. Some of the more interesting ones from Reuters can be seen here. Although the best one so far is here on Getty Images (we can't post these directly on CD, since they are copyrighted, but we can link to them). The President's expression is priceless, as Moe-zilla was approaching rather quickly at the time, and had just missed clipping a VERY EXPENSIVE crystal chandelier by about 1/2" during the approach.

-dave

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

Epic and awesome. Great job MOE

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I have a feeling the faces that President Bush made in some of those photos may end up on Leno or other late night tv shows... :D

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

This makes me like the president more for some reason.

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That is the best picture I have ever seen. Ever. It's moments like that that really drive home the meaning and excitment of FIRST

Jacob

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WOW. Now if we could get the president to show up at nationals...that would be AMAZING!

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champs....


But yes, that would rock SO HARD!!! Imagine the press... and the expansion of FIRST!

Jacob

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

WOW meeting president bush!

this is so inspiring me to work hard to win the VEX inspire award next year!

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It doesn't look like an expression of excitement to me... ;)

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President Bush's face is priceless in that Getty image! I can so see that face dancing in the next Jib-Jab cartoon! Kudos to whoever was driving MOE-zilla at the time. You made my day!

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This is great for FIRST and MOE + FVC and FLL teams. Very well deserved.

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thats really amazing.. i love the faces Bush is making in about 2 of those pictures though.

And Joe is right, that doesn't look like he's excited xD

Congrats MOE on just a wonderful opportunity! having the president come to championships would most definetly create a very large influx of guests at the competition. More awareness for FIRST! haha

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

This is absolutely amazing. Way to go, all who made this happen.

The last time that a FIRST team went to the White House was in 1997, I think. Someone correct me if that is wrong. Back then it was a yearly trip. Now, that tradition will pick back up.

This is yet another reason that the Chairman's Award is the highest of them all.

Andy B.

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

Nope... the terror level was lowered to MOE green for this event.


ahaha I am hilarious.

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Dear Mr. President:

You might have met some good friends of ours, MOE of FIRST Robotics. See, these people won the most prestigious award for our competition, the National Chairman's Award. It is given to the best team there is, in character and spirit, as well as smarts.

You also might have met a little guy dressed in a blue, Dean Kamen. He's the man that started this competition back in 1992, and fifteen years later is grown a lot. I mean "1,300+ schools" kind of a lot. He's a really smart guy, and really wants his idea to grow even more. All it takes is $5,000 per high school and the program will pay for itself in a year.

How? Well, after the one year the program can guarantee the inspiration of minimum 1 student who will go into science and technology. This 1 student will then go on to input a minimum of $5,000 during his career into the economy, guaranteed.

We need you help, Mr. President, to continue to bring up teams like MOE. :]

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

You should have seen his face when Moe broke out with their "Moe Cheer"!

And how much would you pay for a picture of The President doing the "Joe Matt" ?!!! (just wait :) )

-dave

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

Now that will be very hard to beat; unless we can find Chuck Norris.

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

The expresion on the President's face from the picture from Getty Images is one of "that chandelier costs about as much as 5 of thoes robots.......and you missed it by an inch................."

Robot=$5,000-$10,000
Booking Regionals, Championships, Travel Expences, and other expences=$30,000-$40,000
The chance to scare the living daylights out of the President and the secret service at once=Priceless

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

wow simply amazing! Way to go moe!

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To MOE - Congratulations! I know that you portrayed the spirit of the FIRST community well =)

To Dave - You are speaking as if you were present at this event. I am curious to know if you made any comments regarding the pronunciation of the word "nuclear":yikes:

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

Wow, congrats to all the teams that went.
I can hardly think of any better ambassador of FIRST that team 365. Simply amazing.
congrats once again.

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

More like "as much as 100 of those robots..." but who is counting? :)

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

A big congrats to MOE. To everyone behind the scenes that helped make this happen, Thank you. Thank you from the entire FIRST community, this is amazing press and recognition of the highest caliber. This will be a memory like no other for all of those in the White House today.

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

Congratz 365!!! You've achieved one of my dreams. There are some really great pictures. Let's get the President to Nationals before his term is over.

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

Alright, who goosed the president? :eek:

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

I'll get some more pictures up later today. Thanks to 768 and 116 for "hosting" the reception at the Cannon Office Bldg. (attached to the Capital where a lot of Congress have their offices) after the White House visit. And thanks to 768 for the special buttons they made for us! Unfortunately no congressperson showed up, although many sent staffers. I was told that they are rarely in DC on Mondays. And thanks to Dave Lavery for posting the pics so quickly!

Now, the White House. It was very exciting. If you picture the standard view of the WH with the portico and pillars in front, we were in the room just inside the balcony on the second floor. MOE was set up for a demo there, with FLL set up in the East Room (with the famous portrait of George Washington) and FVC in the room on the West side, but I'm not sure what that is called. We had a lot of time to wander the whole area including the Green room and Red room and to look at all the art work. Portraits of most of the presidents are there, including the well known portrait of JFK (with his arms crossed an looking down) and the bust of Lincoln.

They did put down carpeting over the marble floor for the robot, and yes, we did almost hit the very expensive crystal chandelier. First Bush talked to Dean, Woodie, Dave L, Paul Abele, and some other FIRST people. Then he came out where we had been standing for at least 20 minutes, posed on the stair case (with a guard behind us to keep anyone from wandering upstairs). He greeted us, said he had a nice talk with Dean about his latest invention, the water purifier, and mentioned how he fell off a Segway. They they posed with us and Dean said we had a cheer for him (which startled him quite a bit!). Our Chairman's team gave a very short presentation in which he listened graciously, but only showed interest when they mentioned our literacy program. Our drive team then demo'ed the robot, after which Bush took over the controls. While our driver drove the robot Bush controlled the gripper and picked up a ring and hung it. he then left to see the FLL team.

There was a horde of photographers but unfortunately we weren't allowed to take video. Security as you can imagine was extremely tight. The only items allowed in were car keys, wallet, and cameras. No purses, lipsticks, combs, or anything pointed such as pencils. And if can look closely you can see we are all wearing our medals which of course set off the metal detectors.

It was an exciting day but tiring day - we didn't get back until around 11. I'm back at work but as you can see haven't done much yet, so I'll end it here. :D

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

First off, a HUGE Thank you, goes out to all of the FIRST personnel, who made the Washington DC visit a success. MOE 365 worked most closely with John Marchiony, Chief Marketing Officer, and Carol Kauffman, Regional Director. It took many people to organize and execute this event.

MOE's day started with a bus ride to DC on a gorgeous blue-sky-and-sunny day. We took a short walk to the Capitol where we had some photos taken. We then joined other FIRST teams being recognized, FVC 3053, "Occam's Engineers" from Mendham, New Jersey and FLL 1677 Access 9" from South Bend, Indiana for lunch at Union Station.

Then it was off by bus to the White House. MOEzilla and the FVC and FLL bots needed to be in DC this past Friday for security inspections. The bots spent their weekend in an office not far from Laura bush's office.

After meeting up with the FIRST delegation, led by Dean Kamen, Woodie Flowers, Paul Gudonis, John Abele, and Dave Lavery, we had about an hour to wander freely around the Cross Room / Grand Foyer, Blue Room, Red Room, Green Room, East Room, and State Dining Room. These are awesome rooms with many Presidential portraits and great views of DC out of the windows. We took loads of photos.

We spent about 30 minutes getting our large MOE group organized for the photo with the President (Thanks, Carol Kauffman!!!). He only spent a total of less than 10 minutes with us, so everything had to be timed and efficient. As you can see in the photo attached, student team members wore MOE jerseys and adult mentors wore business attire with MOE green highlights (ties, scarves, jackets, etc.). We spent about 10-15 minutes working with the White House staff to determine if and when we could do the MOE cheer.

The President finally arrived after a brief meeting with FIRST leadership. He was very friendly and down-to-earth, admitting his incident with a Segway within minutes of our interaction. :D First were the photos. At the end of the photos, we did the MOE cheer. He was supposed to be ready for it, but the amplification of the sound in the room caused him to jump. It was great.

After that, our Chairman's Award presenters (Andrea, Will, and Eric) described what our team has done to earn the award. Our competition team (Matt, Morgan, and Kevin) then grabbed a keeper tube and drove the bot over to the President. In the fun photo that is on Getty, the bot stops short of the team. The students are looking up because our arm is raised and is literally inches away from the bottom of the "very expensive" chandelier that Dave Lavery mentioned. Our driver got inches away from hitting it two times. Needless to say, our team and the White House staff were holding our collective breath.

The President then got a chance to take control of our arm/gripper controls. He collected a tube, raised the arm all the way up, and (with help from Morgan, our arm driver) released the tube on the top spider leg of a mini-rack we built for the event.

Andrea Agra, our Team Captain, then presented President Bush with a MOE jersey with "Bush" printed on the back.

The President was very congratulatory of the teams and what FIRST has done to further the interest of science and technology in our youth. He also was impressed with the level of technlogy FIRST robots in general contained. Though our brief interaction, he seemed very genuine and friendly.

Many photos were taken of the event, but video and audio were not allowed. So, the best you can hope for are the fun photos that are being posted and some other stories.

It was a terrific day. Thanks FIRST.

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

What? What did you do about tools? (Or is your robot so well behaved that it doesn't make a mess on the carpet :p )

Also, did the Secret Service have to inspect the robot before allowing it to enter?

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

Great stories!! Congratulations, MOE--you made us all proud to be a part of FIRST! :cool:

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I'm very impressed! You guys are an amazing team and truly are a role model for other FIRST teams!

Congrats again on being this year's Championship Chairman's Award winners!

(and Congrats to the Vex and FLL teams as well!)

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

Yes, the Secret Service did want plenty of time to inspect the equipment. All the robots with limited tools and minifields were driven down to the White House on Friday by a mentor, Lou Rosanio (the FVC and FLL teams shipped their robots to us, we used our own FLL and FVC fields). Lou said they were very interested in them - beyond security concerns - but the funniest part is that MOEzilla didn't fit in the storage area they designated, so he spent the weekend in the First Lady's office! Unfortunately we didn't get pictures.

Speaking of pictures, I'm in the process of posting some that I have with me, so check in a couple of hours.

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

MOE, you guys truly deserve all the recognition you have received. I have yet to encounter a team with as much zeal and GP as you all. Thank you for helping bring more attention to FIRST and its participants (not only with all your acheivements, but with those BRIGHT shirts!).
Congratulations and here's to many more successful years!

(And extra props has to be given to the driver who almost took out the chandelier- it made for some excellent photos. :) )

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

I think the look on the face of the woman next to the President is the best because you can see the panic in her eyes.

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The Women next to Bush is Carol Kauffman (FIRST Regional Director) and the student is Andrea Agra the 2007 MOE student caption.

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"Mission Accomplished":rolleyes:

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Hi Carol,

Actually, I was told there were 6 members of Congress, including one Senator.
Many were at a funeral yesterday in California.

The Director of the National Science Foundation was there. As well as many high level representative from the Patent Office, NIST and the Dept. of Homeland Security.
There were also many important staffers there. Many came after being visited by the FLL and FVC teams during the morning.

Love the White House pics!

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

Let's see how long this lasts.
If we could get the president to show up and do his job. Now that would be AMAZING!
:yikes:

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

GREAT JOB MOE!!!

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

We invited our Representative, Congressman Frelinghuysen, and he came for the first 45 minutes or so and really loved watching the robots - in particular FRC. I also know that a representative from New Hampshire and a senator from Hawaii showed up. Our congressman told us that the reason a lot of people could not come was because of the funeral for a congresswoman in California that afternoon. And there were certainly a good number of staffers. I'd say it was largely succesful.

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

Thanks for the shout out of congratulations to MOE, Occams Engineers, and Access 9 in response to our FIRST-sponsored trip to the White House.

I must add that, we are representing the thousands of FIRST teams out there, who worked as hard as we did during the build season and throughout the year. To every student who had to miss even more sleep to study for an exam at 2am, to every mentor who missed that dinner with the family, to every teacher who felt the guilt of leaving his/her class in the hands of a substitute while you travelled to an out-of-town regional, we are representing all of you.

It's a shame that you could not be there with us in person. Every dedicated FIRST team member deserves the experience that our teams had. With any luck (and lots of hard work), FIRST will make this White House recognition an annual one. I hope that teams, currently working so hard getting the word out to their communities, inspiring young children, mentoring other FRC and FVC, FLL, and JFLL teams, interacting with their government officials, and awakening whole new areas around the world to FIRST, will have their day in the sun and be recognized, too.

But, if for some reason that doesn't happen, the beauty of it all is that it is still worth it. To have a senior graduate, who has assembled a drive train when she hardly knew what a gear was as a freshman, who has gone from hardly talking to anyone to being your team's Chairman's Award presenter, or who has learned 3D Studio Max on his own and is now rendering with the best of them, is the best recognition your team and program can have. These individual accomplishments are what will change our culture.

Thank you teams for all your efforts this past season and previous years. Many of us truly love and treaure this part of our lives. Find ways to celebrate in your corner of the globe. Recognize people who made a difference. Make memories. Have fun.

The FIRST White House celebration was a recognition for ALL FIRST teams and the significant change you have all brought about.

Bravo!

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

It'll be on The Daily Show alright.

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I definately agree with ya on this one!
It goes to show how much FIRST has really evolved over the years; who knows... maybe we'll have the President at the Championship even one year :]

MOE, yall are amazing... actually beyond that but I cannot think of a word for ya haha. MOE is just... MOE... better than amazing :cool: Way to go guys... your achievements are very much recognized.

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

Be careful what you wish for. Talk to the teams that were at the White House event about the security preparations. Then think about what that might mean for the Championships. Yes, having a President attend the FIRST Championships would be a very exciting and prestigious thing to have happen. But there is a real potential for the associated security precautions that would have to be put in place to have a very disrupting effect on the Championships. I am not saying that a visit by the President would not be a good thing, but all the impacts of such an event need to be considered.

-dave

Re: pic: The President meets MOE
 

Wow, congrats to all the teams who met the president! MOE, congrats on chairman's too! You've been working hard on that for many years. Its great to see FIRST get attention in this manner... very cool. :)