This coming FRC season, Texas Torque hopes to host the Afghan Dreamers in our lab to compete alongside us in the new district model. They need full funding ($30,000) to come here. We wanted to reach out to the FIRST community to help with their efforts and spread the word. Every donation is tax deductible. If $2000+ is donated by one party, your name or logo (even robotics teams logos) will go on their robot and published media materials. The team can take back the skills they learn from the FIRST community to teach generations of youth in Afghanistan at their new STEM school.
A few members of our team met and worked with this group of girls personally during the 2018 FIRST Global competition, and can without a doubt say we were instantly inspired. Here is a recent article CNN published about their team captain, Fatemah Qaderyan.
Click the link here to learn more and donate. We hope to raise the funds in time for them to make it to Texas!
If you have any questions, feel free to ask and I will do my best to answer.
Sounds like a great effort, but would the Afghani team really be allowed to join the Texas district? What is the procedure for inducting a team outside of the geographical boundaries into a district? I imagine a good number of teams near-but-outside of state/country lines would like to be able to join the closer district than have to travel to a farther regional.
They didn’t have a problem in Ontario last year. Besides, they seem to be working out of Texas and presumably are living there too, so it’s a different situation than a team setting their address to a PO box in another state.
I really do think that this is a great idea and all but I think you should still contact FIRST directly, because the rules might be different. We played with them in the World Championship and heard about there story. We wanted to do the same thing and host a team from Bangladesh. However my mentor said that there was some issue and we were not allowed to. If FIRST does say its okay, I cant promise you I can donate, but I will definitely get the word out.
We have been in contact with FIRST Executives and leaders for both FIRST HQ and FIRST in Texas. Both parties have said everything is fine, and in fact, they are already registered as a team in the FIRST in Texas District for the 2019 season, signed up to attend the same events as Texas Torque.
We have already been through FIRST HQ and FIRST in Texas to figure this out, and all the proper procedures have been completed. They are relocating to our address, as they will be working in our lab, therefore allowing them to compete in the FiT district model.
Will they compete under the same team number as last year? How much of the team is the same as last year’s roster?
They were a great bunch to compete with and I look forward to seeing where their season takes them.
Was the intention for first to have them at North champs then south champs? As a way to expose all of FIRST to their story and mission? What comes next?
Last year I briefly worked with these girls when they were competing in Ontario and I can honestly say they are the most passionate and committed FIRSTers I’ve ever seen. Also, a huge kudos to Torque for hosting this awesome team.
At our current momentum and position, we face a daunting task: the task of spreading the principles of FIRST beyond the context of the developed world and into the developing world. One such principle is Women in STEM. This fundraiser is not only a fight for Women in STEM, but also a fight against the repression of Women in STEM outside America in a fundamentalist society plagued by instability and militancy.
Even though our task within our domestic borders is arguably far from complete, FIRST was meant to be universal and benefit all countries and all high school students around the world. If we do not help our brethren/sisters, then who are we? Why sit at the pile of despair and agony? Why have such a world where a large disparity exists? Why ignore how the other half lives? With even a small donation from each and every individual in the FIRST community, we can change this with the collective will of the greater good, of brotherhood.
We do not ask for much. We just ask for a donation from each and every person, no matter how large or how small. In any case, no students deserve to be left out of progress due to financial reasons. There have been several occurrences of collapse of FRC in other nations for this same cause and let Afghanistan not be another case.
We got the full funding and the letters from US Representatives to bring them here, and the last hurdle they had to pass was interviewing for visas on Jan 31st at the US Embassy in Kabul. The three girls being sent at the time all passed, as they had prior US visas. However, even though his 1 year US Visa expired only two weeks prior to the interview, their technical mentor was not approved for a visa. We tried everything we could to try and get them here for competition, but it would just not work. FIRST has graciously helped them re-register for events elsewhere. The funding given by the generosity of the FIRST community will allow them to still compete, albeit from their lab in Afghanistan and not in the US. We were taken very off-guard by the denial, but are still moving forward. Just a few days ago, we were able to ship their full KOP from the US to Kabul where they will be able to start building for season. The registration might officially take a little longer to show up online for their new regional, but rest assured, it is being worked on.
