I’m the lead mentor for the Yuma Community Team (Team 3785), the GILA MONSTERS!
I’m creating this thread to introduce the team, and as an assignment to our new Gila Monster team members. Thier assignment is to introduce themselves in this forum and what they expect to achieve this year. Please use your initials to sign, so I know who you are.
Ok, now to introduce the team. We’re a 2nd year veteren team, in Yuma, AZ. Last year, our rookie year, we started two weeks before kickoff. We were all new, and didn’t know much about robots. 3 months later we came home with the Quality Award at the AZ Regional.
This year we’re planning ahead, and starting the teaching process sooner by partnering with the local community college and started a class for the high school students to learn about FIRST and robots. We’ll go over last years robot, and add the things we wanted to do for LOGOMOTION. This should be a great prep for next years game, and get the creative juices flowing.
So, with that, join me in introducing the 2012 Gila Monsters! We’re ready for the 2012 season!
I have mixed feelings about having a “new” team called the Gila Monsters from Arizona. But I’m a grumpy old man who’s early memories of FRC are colored by watching Team 64 (The Gila Monsters from Mesa, AZ) absolutely dominate the NASA/VCU Regional in 2001.
Welcome to the Club 3785. It’s still a bit weird for me to commit 3000+ numbers to memory. Heck, when I first started, 800/900 were still considered high.
It seems like this issue is becoming more and more common - but in the grand scheme of things, is any team the same after 10 years? High School Cycles, Job-turnover and time itself often change a team greatly in a span as short as 3 to 4 years. Realistically, a name is nothing more than a name.
Welcome, 3785! I think it’s totally acceptable to use the name ONLY if they do the Gila Monster dance. It was awesome and intimidating all at the same time.
Seriously, though, it’s silly to think there’s ownership of a name, especially from a defunct team. There’s multiple Blue Lightnings out there. Also multiple CHAOSes. The last time I saw a certain visiting mentor we were trying to convince him to call his new robot Chief Delphi, because, well, no one is using that name right now.
Although somewhat important, there are really more important aspects to a team than their name. Try to keep it unique in your general geographic area and time period and you should be ok.
TL;DR: Gila! Gila! Gilagilagila! Best of luck to you in 2012.
Yes, we are the indirect descendants of the original Team 64 Gila Monsters. We brought the name back since our team is also based from the GM Desert Proving Grounds and mentored by GM employees. We’re bringing the legacy with us, and doing the reborn/revamp thing that seems to be popular right now.
As you can see, we’re doing some good things. We won the quality award with a completely rookie team, which is awesome! We got some returning students and new students, so we’re gunning for the gold this year!
As for our purpose this semester, our goal is to learn to do the things we didn’t have time for last year. Things like autonomous, different methods of movement, and more involvement with the community.
