[Karthik]

This thread has irked me somewhat. NASA generously donates a few truckload of money to FIRST every year. Instead of people coming out and thanking NASA for helping our program grow, people are immediately complaining about the allocation funds.

I'm not suggesting that anyone should blindly accept things, but maybe we could give NASA the benefit of the doubt. I think I'm safe in my assumption that NASA has a detailed approval process, and that every team that received a grant is deserving of the money.

Being a member of a team that often gets criticized for our budget, I do take offense to some of the comments in this thread. A team's financial information is private, and they don't need to justify their spending to anyone. Also, just because a team is a "powerhouse" doesn't mean that their pockets are overflowing. Success in this game comes from a wealth of ideas and good engineering, not deep pockets.

So yeah, congratulations to all the teams who earned grants, and a huge thank you to NASA for their generous sponsorship.