[Jack Jones]

Originally Posted by corpralchee

Noticed that you are asking for people to talk about FRC and FLL but not FTC. Any particular reason?

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Originally Posted by FIRST Tech Challenge Announcement

From: Paul Gudonis, President; Steve Chism, Senior Director of Programs

Updated August 1, 2007

After two successful pilot seasons as the FIRST Vex Challenge, we are pleased to announce that the intermediate program, now named the FIRST Tech Challenge, is an official FIRST program. It joins our continuum of FIRST programs with the Junior FIRST LEGO League, FIRST LEGO League, and FIRST Robotics Competition. This program will be structured similarly to our pilot seasons and will continue to target an audience between the FIRST LEGO League and FIRST Robotics Competition both to serve as a feeder program into the FIRST Robotics Competition and to bring FIRST to new geographic areas.

The next season of the FIRST Tech Challenge will begin in September 2007, and planning is underway. Team registration is open. Details on tournaments and season information will be posted starting October 1, 2007. FTC competitions will take place in locations where FIRST has an Affiliate Partner. In certain states where FTC will not be available, such as Michigan, the FIRST Robotics Competition will be the program available to high schools. Please check the FIRST web site for periodic updates.

The FIRST Tech Challenge will continue to use the Vex Robotics Design System for this coming season. FIRST will make Vex kits available at a price that only registered FIRST Tech Challenge teams will be able to access. Teams may also use their existing kits from previous years' competitions. FIRST is actively exploring the use of other robotics platforms of similar scale for the FIRST Tech Challenge for future seasons. While it's unlikely that FTC will use the Vex kits in next year's competition, they can be used in a variety of applications: in classrooms, for training, for demonstrations, etc. After evaluating other robotics kits, we will notify the FIRST community of our future plans.

We are excited to launch the FTC season, sure to engage a greater number of students in the excitement of discovering science, engineering, and technology.