[waialua359]

Originally Posted by GaryVoshol

Mixing apples and oranges. As good as FRC is, it's still not a [inter]nationally-recognized professional robotics competition. Your comparison would be more like the winner of the USYSA (soccer) national tournament getting a standing invite to the White House. That's a little different from MLB, NHL, NFL or NBA.

Although it does say something about our cultural emphasis on sports, we still have to realize that there are dozens or hundreds of educational contests that could be recognized by the President. I'd rather he used his valuable time to run the country, straighten out the financial mess, and budget for STEM opportunities like FIRST.

I beg to differ. FIRST is one of the largest international competitions out there in education. As an educator for the past 15 years, I have yet to see any that's larger in terms of the # of students it impacts and it keeps growing. Its big enough in education to be recognized by the highest leader in our country. It doesnt have to be as big as sports. As you have alluded to in your second paragraph, its a cultural thing.
Heck, the President himself comes from a school that Sports Illustrated ranked as the #1 HS sports program in the entire country earlier this year. But yet, they also have a FIRST Robotics program (2090) that the school puts at the bottom of the barrel in programs that they support.