Sad Day for Seniors

[Ryan Albright]

On the way home from nationals it hit me.....I am now past my name of being a "student" in FIRST. After we lost our last match i moved from that classifcation to mentor. I am really excited that i will be able to mentor other people next year, but its just hard to think for as long as i am involved with FIRST i will never be able to be a operator or human player. That makes me sad cause i love controlling the robot and working on it and now i have to take step back and watch teh students do it and its just hard i guess and i guess iw ill get use to it.

Next year i will be joining a new team 1083 with George, Nathan, and Andrew and i am reawlly excited to be with this team they have a great future ahead, but then i am becomign a alumni of 710 and that has hit me the hardest. I have been with the team since it was a rookie 2001 and i am one of the orginal members and its just sad that i will be moving on from that team. I have my roots in that team and its just going to be hard to move on and i mean i will only be three hours away from them in college but i dont know i am just going to miss it..


Sorry guys i just had to let that off my chest cause it hit me hard on the drive home today

What are other seniors planning to do now since they are moving on.

[Katie Reynolds]

Luckily, Michigan Technological University sponsors a FIRST team so I'll be helping them out next year.

[abeD]

Ya ryan i feel you on this one. Sadly I don't know if Penn has a robotics team so my future in FIRST is still up in the air, but i really will miss being totally immersed in designing, building, and driving our robot.

[Tyler Olds]

It hit me after we lost in the semi's.............

To think that we have invented up to 4 years of our highschool carreer, sacraficing a lot of social interactivity (and a lot of times grades too) and some of us would even say our lives. To have it all come to an end suddenly, all I can say is that I feel lost. With no other team near me I don't know what I will do. FIRST has changed my life in so many ways that I have become dependant on it like many of us fellow FIRSTers have on caffine.

My advice to people who are in the same situation as me. If you can't join a team, either wait for one to come by you, start one, or move to be by one. Also deffinately volunteer every chance you get. You will get a whole new experiance in FIRST and appreciate it even more.

Good luck to everybody graduating this year as we travel out to change the world by spreading the word of FIRST.

[edomus]

Originally Posted by abeD

Ya ryan i feel you on this one. Sadly I don't know if Penn has a robotics team so my future in FIRST is still up in the air, but i really will miss being totally immersed in designing, building, and driving our robot.

Penn is suposed to be mentoring our team, although we havent actually seen them yet,lol.

[OneAngryDaisy]

I've been dreading this day ever since my senior year began. We're amazingly lucky to have had this opportunity, as most teenagers in the world never even hear of FIRST. I also admit robotics has taken over my life, practically every week I'm out doing something for our team. Sometimes it makes me want to apply to a college close to home just so that I can stay with 341- anyone else feel this?

[KenWittlief]

dont get down on yourself - think of a lego league student bemoaning that now thats over for him and now he has to move on to highschool and FIRST

when you get into college you will have opportunities for engineering contests and intercollegiate engineering design competitions that make FIRST look like childs play, seriously.

If you pursue a career in engineering and science then what you did on a FIRST team in HS is only the beginning - the best is yet to come

[shark_byte]

I'l be attending the University of Central Florida next school year, so as long as they continue to host the Florida regional, I'll continue to support the Pink Team!

[suneel112]

Yes, it is sad being a senior and leaving a team. I know I am not a senior yet, but it is inevitable that it will happen, and time will fly by, and 5 competitions later I will realize that I, too, will have to go. (2 off-season [YEAH IRI!!] and 3 in 2005). But remember Dean Kamen's speech. You can start teams in colleges. Plus, you can always "teach" kids how to drive. Sure, you can't do it at official competitions, but during off-season competitions (IRI maybe, Ford Sweet Repeat for sure) there are "mentors only" competitions as well as girls-only competitions. You can still have fun driving or operating as an advisor, just not officially.

[KenWittlief]

in college you get to design, build and drive 'other things'

http://www.rit.edu/~930www/

[Stephen Kowski]

Ryan frankly my last season from 2003 with 312 hit real hard (losing in the division finals by literally less than an inch), but afterwards I have found it has only gotten better....I brought the experience over to Tampa (first team EVER in the 10th largest school district in the country) starting team 1369 (with lots of help, RogerR), and plan to bring more teams to Tampa. Being a mentor is quite a different experience, and it is just another phase of life. Don't look at it as the end of such a great experience, but rather as another great experience you are about to be a part of. Good Luck @ UCF I know you will have a great time with 1083 (what a great group). Wish some ppl would come to USF to help, but I'll work around that

P.S. Seniors don't forget about FIRST College Connect...it is a very simple effective tool http://www.firstcollegeconnect.com/

[Ben Lauer]

Well. I am almost depressed. The school I am going to doesn't have a robotics team that it sponsors, eventhough some current ex-FIRST students have tried to get them to start one. I guess I will just have to try anyway!

[Ian W.]

Well, for me, I'm sending in my deposit for WPI tomorrow (or soon after), so I'll be on 190 next year. They were like my fan club this year anyways, they kept following me around everywhere, SBPLI, Drexl, hell, even when my team went out to dinner in Atlanta!

Going to wrap up the year with my team, hopefully set them up so they're not entirely screwed next year (things are looking like they may not be all that great at the moment, for several areas), and say goodbye in a month or two.

I have to say, it's been a fun three years on 810, but like everything, nothing last for ever, and it's time to move on. FIRST has definitely has had, and will continue to have, a huge impact on my life (in more than one way), and I'll continue with it as long as I can, but there are bigger and better things to do. Mars, anyone? :-p

[Meredith Rice]

Originally Posted by OneAngryDaisy

I've been dreading this day ever since my senior year began. We're amazingly lucky to have had this opportunity, as most teenagers in the world never even hear of FIRST. I also admit robotics has taken over my life, practically every week I'm out doing something for our team. Sometimes it makes me want to apply to a college close to home just so that I can stay with 341- anyone else feel this?

I feel ya. I'm going to the University of Delaware next year and while its just 25 minutes from MOE I dont think I could join another team when I am so attached to my own. Since I am relatively close to home (just an hour and half ride by train) I will be helping 433 out with some Chairmans Award stuff and I am sure I will annually return to Drexel for my most favorite regional, however it will definately be hard not being in that drivers station. My family and friends got a real good look at just how addicted to FIRST I am when I tried for quite some time, even up to less than a week before the champs, to find some way down to Atlanta to volunteer. They not suprisingly said no and for me to move on. It was a rude awakening. I know though I will have to still be involved one way or another, mentoring and volunteering most likely, just so long as I can still be a part of FIRST.

[WernerNYK]

Originally Posted by Ian W.

Well, for me, I'm sending in my deposit for WPI tomorrow (or soon after), so I'll be on 190 next year. They were like my fan club this year anyways, they kept following me around everywhere, SBPLI, Drexl, hell, even when my team went out to dinner in Atlanta!

Yeaaaaa, that's right!