A loss of a Mentor

[Gboehm]

I have not posted in a long time, but I felt that this needed posting. John Korzick who was a mentor for team 1516 and most recently an assistant regional director for FIRST, passed away on Sunday.

I was the Team Captain for 1516 in 2007, and Mr. Korzick was our mentor. We were a very small team, who worked the KISS philosophy to the max. We took that to the #3 seed at SVR, ended up winning there, and finally placing 8th in the Archimedes Division in Atlanta.

Mr. Korzick firmly held the philosophy that it was our robot, but he provided us guidance, and support. He taught us many life lessons, but always made us work through our own problems. You never saw him with the team on the playing field wearing the "dot" badge, but he was always in the first row to cheer us on. When ever we had frustration with our robot, he would walk over to us and say "you gotta dance with who brung ya."

I will never forget his face when our humble team with one mentor won the Silicon Valley Regional. I have attached a photo of that day.

http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-...ear-dies-heart