2014 Championship Conference

[KathieK]

2014 FIRST Championship Conferences
FIRST Championship, St. Louis, MO | April 23rd-24th

Description
FIRST is excited to announce that we are accepting presentation proposals for the eleventh annual FIRST Championship Conference. We are looking for 45-minute workshops on topics of interest to FIRST Robotics (FRC), FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC) and FIRST LEGO League (FLL) teams, coaches, mentors, students, and prospective leaders. You may present individually or as part of a group. FIRST will provide a laptop and projector for each presentation. Any additional equipment will be the presenter’s responsibility to provide.

We encourage presentations in all technical and non-technical areas of FIRST. Please submit proposals for any topic that is relevant to current and/or future FLL, FTC, and FRC teams and coaches. We have selected a few themes this year, to help get your creative thoughts flowing! The 2014 Robotics Conference will highlight Innovation and Women in STEM. We will certainly accept proposals outside these two themes.

Selected proposals will presented at the conference in St. Louis on April 23rd - 24th. Please note that travel and accommodations will not be provided by FIRST.


Proposals
If you are interested in submitting a proposal for a 45-minute presentation in St. Louis, please submit your idea on or before Monday, February 17th by clicking here to fill out a short application.


Past Presentations
This list shows some examples of topics that teams have found useful. Please don’t limit your proposal to the topics on this list. We welcome any innovative ideas that enlighten and engage FIRST participants and inspire future leaders in science and technology!

• Robot design tools and strategies (design software, programming languages)
• How to lead a sustainable FIRST team
• Marketing tips and advice for teams (fundraising, budgeting, finding sponsors)
• Preparing for college (applications, essays, interviews, scholarships)
• Team organization and leadership
• Progression within FIRST programs (example: transitioning from FLL to FTC)
• How to recruit and retain volunteers

[RoboMom]

Has anyone heard anything more about this? According to the website schedule was supposed to been posted March 19. http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprogr...nd-conferences

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by RoboMom

Has anyone heard anything more about this? According to the website schedule was supposed to been posted March 19. http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprogr...nd-conferences

Yeah, I haven't heard back.

[wireties]

I just got a call from FIRST headquarters.

[RoboMom]

I received an email this afternoon.

[SteveB2977]

So does that mean that something will be posted soon?

[waialua359]

I got a voicemail today and plan to call back tomorrow.
It looks like my presentation proposal on grant writing/sustainability was accepted.
Looks like itll be a busy Wed for me as I attend the HOF meeting/pin ceremony and then the presentation.

Last time we had about 200 people. Hopefully we get more this time.

[wireties]

The "Real-Time Software in FRC Robotics" presentation is on April 23rd at 5PM in room 230. We will be jamming a lot of info into 45 minutes!

Abstract:

This presentation answers common questions from students and CD members. Topics include pre-emptive priority-based scheduling, using semaphores and messages for synchronization and mutual exclusion, and the structure of the operating system, libraries and application tasks running on a FRC robot. Time allowing, we'll review the structure of templates provided by WPI, review analysis techniques and recommended practices.

[wireties]

Originally Posted by waialua359

I got a voicemail today and plan to call back tomorrow.
It looks like my presentation proposal on grant writing/sustainability was accepted.

Looking forward to it!

[KathieK]

"Mentors: How to Hire 'Em, How to Fire 'Em" will be presented Thursday, April 24, 2014, at 11:00 AM in Room 230. It's a hot topic that I get many requests for assistance with as a FIRST Senior Mentor. Looking forward to seeing everyone.

[RoboMom]

I'll be following Kathie with:

Corporate Volunteers (and why you want to engage them)

Abstract: FIRST events are a great match for engaging corporate volunteers. Let's talk about some best practices for recruitment, coordination and recognition while meeting the unique needs of corporate volunteers for the following: Jr.FLL Expos, FLL and FTC qualifiers and championships, FRC Districts and Regional's, kickoffs and workshops.
The targeted audience for this session is anyone who needs to recruit and coordinate FIRST volunteers. Most of the hints are for event volunteers, but could also be adapted for mentors.

Jenny Beatty works for Volunteer Maryland - an AmeriCorps program administered through the Governor's Office. (www.volunteermaryland.org). She is serving with STEMaction Inc. (www.stemaction.org) to create a sustainable infrastructure to recruit and manage event volunteers for all 4 FIRST programs in Maryland. She is co-founder of NEMO (Non-Engineering Mentor Organization) www.firstnemo.org.

[Carol]

How did you hear? We have heard nothing about our submissions.

[RoboMom]

Originally Posted by Carol

How did you hear? We have heard nothing about our submissions.

Carol, I think they are catching up. I bugged them via email because of the date clearly posted on the website. Others have gotten phone calls.

[jwalters1902]

4-H Exploding Bacon 1902 will be doing the Big Bacon Theory of Image and Marketing this year on the 24th.

Hope to see you there.

[Carol]

Originally Posted by RoboMom

Carol, I think they are catching up. I bugged them via email because of the date clearly posted on the website. Others have gotten phone calls.

Do you have the email address? We need to start getting panelists so I want to bug them too.