[archiver]

Posted by Steve Shade.

Engineer on team #7, Firestorm, from Parkville High School and NASA GSFC / Black & Decker / Raytheon / AAI .

Posted on 4/15/2000 10:28 AM MST


In Reply to: The Transition posted by Kate on 4/14/2000 12:52 PM MST:



Like Joe I also stayed on the same team in college. Partially because, including rookies, thee are only 4 teams in the state of Maryland. The other reason is that we have the entire month of January off because of a Winterterm and the only team close to me is my high school's.

Going back felt different this year. And I am the first college student to go back on my team. So I had to define and constantly change my role on the team. It gave me a new challenge and has made me realize how completely lucky I was being on a team structure that is a little bit diffeent from everything else I have seen (this is both good and bad). This year I wasn't even planning on going to the Nationals, or anything for that matter, but somehow, there was a last minute opening, and I made it to Florida.

This year it all felt different, I was no longer in high school. I had friends on other teams! And I was actually relaxed for the most part at the competition. I think the hardest part for me was and still is, trying to define what my role is on the team.

Like colleen said, i know with all of my friends, I will always have a home in FIRST, no matter what team I'm on. There is no way i could have made it through all of this year, unless i was talking with all of you.

I love the new challenge of trying to explain how to do something instead of just doing it. And I'm still working on understanding what it is that I'm supposed to do, but i like the change of roles and i love FIRST.

If anyone out there is comming to the University of Maryland: College Park or any Maryland University, let me know! As of right now, I'm still trying to let people know what FIRST is.

Steve
Team 7