No teams in the UK?

[RonnyV]

Originally Posted by mrnoble

Am I right? I went through the blue alliance and can't find any. I have a bunch of connections over there through family and the school system and might be interested in seein what can be done to bring FIRST to the UK. Anyone know anything that I don't?

I've been to the UK this year. We've visited London where a rookie FTC team was and they were having problems.

The rookie FTCs were an international school that were completely new to first. The Griffens #1884 are from the American School London. (ASL)

I heard some rumors prior to the season they would've been starting a new rookie FRC team somewhere else in London which is team 5781 I guess..

We've tried to get in touch multiple times with the teams in London and also asked them why they wouldn't help the rookie FTC team in London.
Because that was our first advice for the rookie FTCs: get in touch with the other FRC team in London, they know how to built a robot etc. and physical interaction and workshops is just easier than online documents and skype calls

Eventually they/we got in touch and their reaction was pretty harsh, a short summary: FTC is to expensive for European teams, go do VEX because it's a lot cheaper or start a FRC team.

The rookie FTC team didn't had the resources at their school to participate in FRC and already bought parts for FTC. So they asked 1884 if they could help out them with brainstorming etc and just the basic robotics things. But sadly we've never heard anything else anymore after that...

So we decided to visit the UK and help out the FTC team. Me and a teacher went for a short weekend during thanksgiving. We got in touch again with the FRC team and tried to arrange a meeting while we were in London.

After a positive reaction within a 30min timeframe saying: Awesome to hear form you, let me check with the team because of thanksgiving etc..
And then a couple of emails later on they never replied anymore.. Wasn't really able to get them on the phone either...

So eventually the FTC team made an appointment for around 5 o'clock or so. After waiting outside for 20minutes where we should meet, walking inside multiple times nobody knew who we had an appointment with.. And their reply on the name we talked to was: He already left, he's not in the building anymore.

So yeah..... that was our FRC experience with them. And all this since we've been in touch with them last year in St Louis, where they were super enthusiastic and willing to spread FIRST in Europe.

Never really heard from them anymore.. and about the FTC team.. they visited us at one of our FLL regionals where we organized a EU FTC Meet + Seminars. They've learned a lot there and we helped them out with the basics some more.
A teacher who wasn't inspired or motivated became super passionate and was already talking about starting FLL in their first grade etc. (He was an IT teacher and gave some basic programming.)

The teacher started helping out the team. He knew how the lasercutter worked etc and eventually they participated at our FTC Dutch Open in Eindhoven. (The friday before they still had problems and two guys of our team helped them out during the night at the hotel. Which resolved in a driving robot with a lift going up and down for the lowest rolling goal)

So overal the team is very interested in starting more FIRST teams in the UK after all and are passionated to participate next year again. Besides these contacts I've got another contact at Reeds Robotics.

They have multiple FLL teams & one FTC team. They know a lot more about the FIRST program within England.

So you, if you want to get in touch with some people feel free to send me a PM with your email and/or skype. And I'll definitely get in touch!!

Kind regards,

Ron