Quote:
Originally Posted by Dan Petrovic
I love the excitement from the students during that last shot. You can tell they worked very hard.  |
I am really glad you brought this up. The levels of maturity, determination and shear grit that I have seen in the students on this team this year can only be described as inspirational. They truly run the show. Every part (aside from a few which were water jetted in order to be feasible) was designed in CAD and manually machined by students. Every lightening hole seen on this machine (there are thousands of them) were machined on a manual mill from the 60's. When parts needed to be remade (the team made the decision to extend the height of the rear elevator by 4" to eliminate any rubbing of recycling containers on totes) the response was "if it's what we need I am ready to remake them," no complaints, no groans. When it snowed and the school was closed, the students arranged to move the things we needed to operate to another location and traveled in order to get a few more work hours in. (Thank you to team 190 and WPI for sharing your space with us). These students have brought me to tears several times because I am unable to express how proud I am of them.
This is what I love about FIRST. The number of times that FRC teams have showed me students who are wise beyond their years and can solve any problem with "I will work longer" or "I will work harder" is too high to count and it is what makes this organization addicting.
The moment in the video that encited such excitement was the first time that we surpassed our expected scoring abilities during an accurately timed practice session, the stack was placed just before time expired. It really was the moment that the hard work payed off in a very tangible way. The moment still gives me chills.
~DK