What's really important after the competitons are all said and done for the year..

[Elgin Clock]

IN a typical FIRST season we all get caught up in the moment.
Whether it becomes your turn to experience (to steal an ABC sports tag-line here) The thrill of victory, or the agony of defeat on the playing field it doesn't really matter in the long run..

Whether it be the joy of having a mentor recognized for his or her efforts on the team, or learning that your friends' team has accomplished the impossible by getting a nation wide top score.
Or whether it be the agony of your robot being dead in the finals, or a crate that doesn't arrive in time for the event you are competing at.

All of these are resultants of FIRST. But, there is a deeper meaning into why Dean is the way he is. He understands the need for things to change and for that change engineers and scientists are needed to solve the worlds problems.

Take this for example:

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...un_clean_water

Hundreds, probably closer to thousands of lives were saved from the aftermath of the terrible tsunami incident because the engineers of the world, along with the humanitarians, (of which I believe Dean is fitting to both categories) worked together to get water to the people who needed it most.

This is why we are here. To better ourselves, and to better our world.

Who cares about a lost match, or a broken robot transmission in the end. When things break, or you are defeated, it just makes you want to fix what is wrong, or go back and learn from your mistakes and make it a better time the next time around..

I'm not sure really where I was originally going with this thread, but I found that story, and it gave me hope.

Hope that the students of FIRST will lead a better world in the future.

Hope that today's problems will end with tomorrow's solutions.

And Hope that we all take this program for what it is, and use FIRST, FLL and now VEX Robotics as a vehicle to inspire people in the ways of science, technology, and engineering...


And I hope that at least some of you will help in this cause:

This year's World Water Day marks the launching of the "Water for Life" decade, during which the United Nations and governments are seeking to halve the number of people without access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation by 2015.

Who cares about making trivial things such as the flying cars that we have been promised by future predictors and movies alike, when a person around the world from you has never even ridden in a car, but would only like a fresh drink of water every day just to survive...

[Rosiebotboss]

Elgin,

Well said. One of the things we do on our team is empahsize from the start that the program is sooooo much more than robots. Every good educational program needs a vehicle. In this one the robot is the vehicle.

After 4 years of existence we finally got that message across to the School Comm and they are now contributing to the financial health of the team. So by being an education driven team, not a field of competition results oriented team like some, we are able to spend some more time teaching instead of fundraising.

[KenWittlief]

one thing that is important after FIRST?

now you have something AWESOME to put on your college applications :^)