A plead to FIRST, anyone else agree?

[E. Wood]

I have two points I would like to bring up.

First is the idea that the driving principles of FIRST are brought up too many times during competitions. Yes competition is a part of FIRST but it is just a part. If you attend three regionals, it’s only nine days. If you include the six week build season really the competition is only 48 days long, start to finish. Now I understand that every team is run differently, but the teams that I am associated with work during the so called off-season to promote STEM education and participate in community service events. Compare 48 days to 317 and tell me that other things FIRST teams do are not as worthy of public airtime as the robots are. I have heard many times over my years as a student and now a mentor that FIRST uses the competition to achieve its goals. The competition is not the point, it is merely a tool. The ideas and goals of FIRST are brought up during competitions because it is the organization’s most public event and they want the public to know that FIRST is about more than a robotics competition. That’s why the two highest awards given have nothing to do with the robots performance but instead with a team’s ability to achieve the goals of FIRST. If you are unsure of what these goals are visit the FIRST website and read their mission statement.

Also I happen to work with some wonderful, very talented students who do not consider themselves "nerds". Some of these students do not work on the robot and are inspired and excited by the education and outreach side of our teams. Others of these students do work on the robot but do not differ from other students their age in way besides the fact that they are on a FIRST team. I too do not consider myself a "nerd". Sure, I have what you may call "nerdy" moments and be an engineer by trade but this does not automatically make me a nerd. I believe that FIRST students can be very creative, bright students but to call us all "nerds" is unfair. That is a title that must be accept and carried by each individual person. If you want to be a nerd, good for you, there is nothing wrong with that, but some of us have other titles in mind for ourselves.