Unnofficial? (FIRST Robotics Singapore)

[Katie Reynolds]

I'm sure FIRST is very capable of reaching out to Singapore - but maybe these teams don't want to be part of FIRST. It looks like the robots and field they're building are much smaller, and therefore less costly.

The Registration Fee for the FRS 2005 Competition:

* Registering on or before 5pm on January 14th, 2005,
the Registration Fee per team is S$500.00.

* Registering between January 15th, 2005 & on or before 5pm on January 31st, 2005,
the Registration Fee per team is S$600.00.

1.00 US dollar = 0.61 Singapore dollars. -- it costs $819-$983 USD to register for FRS .. versus the $6,000 USD it costs to register for FRC.


FIRST is pretty expensive. And this looks like FLL on an FRC field... kind of a combination of both.

The robotics learning model is to have students meet a specific challenge by designing and building their robots from basic components in order to understand the scale and the details of such (R&D prototyping) projects. Thus, the popular American FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) was the chosen platform for the second annual NSRL which then was renamed FIRST Robotics Singapore (FRS).

The inaugural FRS was held in March 2004. With the invaluable help of various enthusiastic volunteers, mentors and invited FRC-
WRRF personnel (from the USA), FRS 2004 was a notable success. Its "Stack Attack" challenge was met by 27 teams from secondary schools, JCs and (academically equivalent) institutes. The challenge was a scaled-down, modified version of a previous FRC competition.

Given 8 weeks to learn about robot design and construction, the teams, guided by their mentors, competed in the Finals held at the Singapore EXPO from March 16th to 19th, 2004. Very noticeable and welcoming was the enthusiasm shown by all the participants during the Finals. Of even greater significance were the signs of the "gracious professionalism" and sharing among rival teams during the competition.

From: http://www.science.edu.sg/ssc/events...nt=342&cat=343

[J Flex 188]

Just a thought.

We here in North America tend to get a bit wrapped up in our own devices, but when a competition like this or a link like this is posted to a different country, from the posts here (not that it was anyones intent in the first place) it seems that we take in certain stereotypes about the participants. One can always say it is in jest, and I'm fairly certain that everyone is guilty of it at least once in their lives, but what would happen if a student from Japan who was looking to start their own team for FIRST came in and saw how he was being profiled, even in a light-hearted manner. I'm of asian descent, and for my parents its always schoolwork that comes first, even more so this year because of the importance of getting into university. When the FIRST season comes, I get incredibly stressed out at times but the fun nature of competitions and the rewarding feeling that something you helped build is actually doing its job keeps me going through assignments and exams. Every student in the world has to deal with this, whether they are from Israel, South Africa, England, the United States or Japan.

Diversity means diversity in ideas too. Some of the robots from the singapore competition might have employed strategies or ideas that we may not even have come up with in North America. All that I'm saying is simply watch what you post, despite the fact that its all in fun anyways. I hope. =)