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UFH: Derek Bessette
Thread created automatically to discuss UFH Honoree: Derek Bessette.
Name: Derek Bessette Date Honored: 08-14-2006 Years involved w/FIRST: 4 FIRST Team(s): General Motors - St. Catharines Powertrain/Allied Marine and Industrial &, Governor Simcoe Secondary School (1114) Role: Design and Build Mentor Quote: Learn all you can from the mistakes of others. You won't have time to make them all yourself. Bio: Derek Bessette is one of the extraordinary mentors from the successful team #1114. He takes on a lot of responsibilities for the team, and fills a lot of roles. He told us, "I am the lead Mentor for the Design and Build Sub-Team. I take the ideas from the NiagaraFIRST brainstorming session and review it with the design team. From these ideas we come up with a robot design, create drawings and pass them on to the build team. I help teach the team how to properly build parts and hone their skills on the use of the CNC and manual machines in our shop. I am in charge of parts acquisition and managing the GM sponsored portion of the robot parts budget. I am also the lead GM mentor for team 1114. In this role I work with Greg Phillips, the Governor High School teacher team leader, and the other mentors to help guide the team. Finally, I am the coach for the 1114 drive team." Derek also has a very inspiring moment he calls his favorite. "My favorite FIRST memory is from the 2006 season at the Great Lakes regional. We worked very hard on this years robot and had great involvement and dedication by a large group of students. The regional started out fairly well. We were winning matches and the robot and students were performing great, except for one thing. We kept breaking our drive belts on the new tank drive train we decided on for this season. The problem slowly got worse as the regional went on and as we got more defensive attention put on us by opposing robots. Through the semi-finals and finals, it felt like we were changing belts between every match. As I discussed some strategy with the other teams, I looked over and saw two of our students, a teacher and a college student working to replace a belt. They were working in perfect unison at lightning speed. The stress level was high, but the students were calm as can be, working quickly but steadily to get the job done. I have never encountered so many problems at one regional event. But with the hard work of everyone on the team we were able to push through those problems and win the regional. I have never been so proud to be a mentor." Additionally, he has worked hard to help guide his team toward success. "As a team, we have had many accomplishments over the last four years. We have won many technical awards and regional events due to the hard work of our team. We also won our first Chairman’s award this year at the Waterloo regional. We have grown FIRST in the area by starting two new FRC teams and running a local FLL tournament which has increased the number of teams in our area." Derek had a concise, but distinct way of describing the FIRST program. "FIRST is by far the best program available for getting young students excited about engineering and technology. It’s a fun way to learn for kids of all ages." Lastly, he had this to say: "My advice to FIRST-ers out there is work hard, have fun, and keep learning. This is a great program, however you won’t get much out of it without putting something in. Find a way to balance FIRST into your life and work as hard as you can to be a contributing member on your team. Be constructive with your criticism of others and be liberal with your praise. Always listen to the ideas of others, you’ll be surprised how a bad idea can lead to a great one. " Congratulations to Derek Bessette, recepient of our next Unsung Heroes Award! Nominated By: Karthik Last edited by Brandon Martus : 12-11-2013 at 20:57. |
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