Why did I join FIRST?
Hm. Well. I hadn't even heard about it until I started shadowing at different highschools. I was looking at attending a specialty center for Engineering, and they required their students to participate. I attended a meeting, and went to the following competition. Instantly I was in love. I always hated Sports because the chick that worked out more was better, and battles of the brains were too competitive for me.
When I joined the FIRST Robotics team at DRHS I was just in it because I wanted to go to Competition. I ended up being the Programmer for this year, and quite possibly the next three. I didn't start looking at how many girls were at FIRST until I was at VCU. I'm one of 2 girls that actually helps with the build of the Robot. The other one is quite annoying and hardly ever there. I didn't think anything of it until I got to VCU Regional and there were only 7-10 teams out of 61 that had more than 1-2 girls on their team that did more than cheerlead.
I am an advocate for team spirit any day of the week. However, there is nothing I love more, as a "nerd chick" than to see more girls getting more assertive in the technological field. ^_^ Why, once I even had the pleasure of meeting Woody, and he told me how great it is to see girls out in the pits working on the bots.
And as a side note: I did not intend to join first to meet guys, but when you're babysitting the bot while the rest of your team is out eating lunch... Sometimes they are just drawn to you. o_o No lie. It is not a reason. It is a perk. ^_^
Sara
