Hey guys, i’m a first student, founder and a mentor of the very first Ukranian FRC team. It’s called Steppe Steppers. I’m super excited to see robotics entering to my country (i’m Ukranian, currently a part of a Mexican team Tec Gear 6106), but we are struggling with getting enough budget. Since the situation on the country is kind of tough at the moment we are looking for international sponsors that could provide us financial support, help with transport, tools, materials, it could be anything. Also, if your team happen to have old chassis, motor, electronics that you’re ready to donate or you are ready to help financially we will be very happy to get in touch with you). It is my first experience of creating a team in a new country so any advices and comments are welcome and appreciated!
Hi Kira,
This is something I may be interested in helping with. There are a some questions that would be helpful if you can answer, not just for myself but also for anyone else who may want to help.
First - you mention that you’re a student and a mentor. Would you mind clarifying your current status? There are a number of things I would prefer to discuss through DM’s but I’d like to confirm that you’re an adult before messaging you privately.
Second - I am unable to find your new team on The Blue Alliance, which could be because it’s brand new and doesn’t exist there yet, but could you please clarify the status of your team? Have you registered with FIRST yet? Do you have a plan for how/where you will compete this season? There have been a couple Ukrainian teams in the past, and they have generally competed at the Turkish regionals. I do not see any Ukrainian teams registered for any Turkish event at this time, although if the other hurdles can be overcome it may not be too late to register.
Third, there is an individual on this forum who was a Dean’s List Finalist winner at the 2020 Bosphorus regional from team 7851 from Kyiv. I don’t know if they’re still involved in the program but you may want to reach out to them for advice on running a team in Ukraine. Obviously a lot has changed since 2020 but they might be a good source of information. @nikita.usatyuk
If you can clarify these things we can talk about what steps might be possible to help you out.
Thank you!
Hello, thank you for the reaction to this post, and surely i can answer to all of your questions.
Officially i’m still a high school student in Mexico, in Ukraine, however, i would be graduating at the moment (Ukrainian education system only has 2 years of high school, while in Mexico it’s 3 years). So technically i’m still a student. I’m a student member of the team Tec Gear 6106. Also at the moment for our impact and my personal projects i’m helping to create a team in Ukraine, so non officially i’m a mentor of that team. (Basically i’m helping with sharing my experience with students, giving a hand of help with organisation process, budget, etc.). Just to let you know i’m still under age of 18, so if you don’t feel confortable contacting me thru DM, i would be happy to answer all of your questions here in the forum or put you in touch with the coach of my team.
Unfortunately, the team is still not visible at the Blue Alliance page, due to a few reasons, such as:
- We haven’t payed the registration fee (6000$), but the team is already registered.
- We are in a waitlist for 2 Turkish regionals (Marmara and Istanbul), and since we don’t have any place for 2024 competition season conformed it’s taking longer for the team to get a 4 (or 5) digits number.
I’m aware of one Ukrainian team (NeuraBl!nk 7851) previously competing, but as far as i know this team is no longer existing. Thank you for an advice to contact them, we are trying to keep in touch with European FIRST teams, especially ones close or inside of Ukraine.
I hope i could answer all of your questions and thanks for your answer again)
Thank you for the followup information, things are a bit clearer now.
It would probably be best for me to get into contact with the coach of your team. Are they on this forum or able to join? I am not opposed to communicating with you, and I admire your effort in attempting to get this going. However if we are going to make this happen there will have to be a fair amount of information exchanged, much of which should not be posted publicly, so DM’s will be necessary. At the very minimum I’d like a third observer even if you are going to spearhead the effort. If they do not want to use this website they could also join just to exchange contact information with me and we can use a communication platform they prefer. Let me know what works best.
In the meantime, here are the main difficulties I can think of:
- Raising the registration money, paying it to FIRST, and getting off the waitlist for at least one of your regionals
- Acquiring the parts to build a robot, and actually building it
- Transporting the team and robot from Ukraine to Türkiye and back
I don’t know too much about item 3, but if that one is solvable items 1 and 2 likely are as well.
@BryceHanson Aren’t you currently helping out an international team in Asia? Maybe you might have some insight for these folks 
We agreed to make a group in What’s app, and my coach also will be there. If that’s fine for you
Thanks Kira - if that’s what’s easiest for your team and gets the coach involved, it will work at least to get started with. I sent an email to the address provided.
It’s up to you, but you may want to edit your post to remove the email, just to avoid potential spam/privacy concerns.
Thank you, we just received your email
For anyone else following this thread - I believe I am now in contact with Kira’s team and her coaches, and was able to confirm through official channels that there is a Ukrainian team attempting to register.
I will probably stop posting here, at least for the time being. I will do my best to help with this but don’t necessarily have all the answers, so if anyone else has anything to contribute, please don’t hesitate to chime in. The more people that might have something to add, the better our chances of helping Ukraine rejoin FRC.
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