FRC Blogged - FMS White Paper, The New Media Award, and District Dates

[ehochstein]

http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprogr.../blog-08-28-12

Blog Date: Tuesday, August 28, 2012 - 13:31.Hello Teams,

As promised in the Einstein Investigation Report, FRC Engineering has created a white paper to help you understand how the Field Management System (FMS) works. You can download the document here.

Also, what do Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Pinterest, Flickr, and iPhones have in common? Each were invented after the Website Award – recognizing excellence in student designed, built, and managed team websites – was introduced by FRC. The ways to create and deliver content have grown exponentially over the last ten years, so it’s time to evolve the FRC Website Award. To continue to challenge FRC students, the Website Award has morphed into the New Media Award.

The FRC New Media Award will recognize a team’s creative use of digital media and devices to create and distribute content that is used to promote the team’s profile, achievements, and outreach, along with the FIRST mission. We are working feverishly to ready the New Media Award for the 2013 season. Continue to tune in to the FRC Blog – we’ll keep you posted as the New Media Award takes shape.

And, keep working on your team sites. Websites will still count toward the New Media Award as they are a part of digital media – even though now you have many additional ways to create and spread the word about FIRST and your team. In any case, I’m sure you aren’t working on your websites ‘just’ to win an award! Awards are a wonderful way to recognize a job well done, but if you think about it, letting people know about your team and getting people excited about science and technology is where the real value is.

Finally, for folks participating in the District structure only (MAR and Michigan teams), the registration dates for district events are a little different this year:

•9/27/2012 District Initial Event Registration opens. District teams may only register for one district event during Initial Event Registration. This will allow more district teams to get into their first choice district event before slots are filled by teams choosing their second event.
•10/11/12 District Second Event Registration opens. District teams may choose their second district event. Just like last year, district teams may not register for a regional event until they have registered for their two district events.
•10/25/12 Regional Second Event registration opens.
I’ll blog again soon.
Frank