Start a Rookie Team

Each school year, teams are formed in the fall. Emphasis is on a competition-based cooperative experience across teams. Competitions take place in March and April. FRC Regional events are typically held in university arenas. They involve 40 to 70 teams cheered by thousands of fans over three days. A championship event caps the season. Referees oversee the competition while Judges talk to teams for awards in design, technology, sportsmanship and commitment to FIRST principles. The Chairman’s Award is FIRST’s highest honor and it doesn't care where you finish in the standings.

What is unique about the FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) program?

FRC is a mentor-based program that bears more similarity to the Westinghouse Science Award where students work hand-in-hand with renouned researchers, rather than a local science fair where students are expected to work alone. FIRST encourages many different approaches to building a team. An all-student driven program can work just as well as the more typical student-mentor co-operative, but remember that the FIRST Robotics Competition is a professional mentor-based program, so recruit and involve mentors to consult, advise, and directly work with the students as much as possible. We're striving to expose students to the professional working world and make heros of the engineers responsible for designing the technical world we live in.

FRC rewards students for building partnerships that last, excellence in design, demonstrated team spirit, gracious professionalism and maturity, and the ability to overcome obstacles. Scoring the most points is a secondary goal.

• It is a sport where the participants play with the pros and learn from them
• FRC makes designing and building a robot a fascinating real-world professional experience
• Competing on stage brings participants as much excitement and adrenaline rush as conventional varsity tournaments
• Every student can turn pro in this sport.
• The game rules are a surprise every year

Where to Begin...Just Thinkin' About It

The FIRST website is the PRIMARY source for everything FRC related.
Here are FIRST's resources on How to Start a FIRST Robotics Competition Team
Probably the most enlightening documents are:

• Starting an FRC Team
• FRC Handbook an overview
• FIRST Mentoring Guide to handout to new mentors you enlist

Test The Waters...Talk About It

Your first and most important contact when you just begin to think about FIRST and what it all means is the FIRST Regional Director for your area or for the Regional competition you'd like to attend. Regional Directors can show you what it's all about, set up visits with local teams so you can talk to students, mentors, teachers, administrators. Regional Directors know all the local resources available and can advise and connect you directly with help from other teams, floating mentors, and resources to get you up and running.

Your second most useful contact is the Senior Mentor if your area has one. Senior Mentors work to recruit and support FIRST Team Mentors and FIRST Event Volunteers.

These people can arrange for administrators, students and prospective mentors to experience an event or even a whole season by shadowing a veteran team. In addition to the official competition events, a large number of smaller team-run off-season events take place where teachers and students can get a real feel for just what it is FIRST does. Off-season events encourage "pre-rookies" to join a team for a day or enter your own "team" by using an extra robot that veterans will loan you.

Take the Big Step...Form a Team

When you're ready to take the big step register your new team at: Team Information Management System
or TIMS for short. Registration can be done beginning at the end of September and the registration fee is not due until December, but the important thing is to get registered early, so you can begin receiving help.

• FIRST Team Support email or by phone (800 871 8326, press 0) - FIRST Team Support has all the administration answers.
• FIRST Web site - www.usfirst.org

Connect with the FIRST Community

You are not alone!
A basic FIRST tenet is teams working cooperatively. Here are only a few of the main sites, but many, many more resources are made available by teams, organizations, and individuals as part of their program.

• Chiefdelphi FIRST Teams Forum a massive forum frequented by FIRST teams from around the world and your neighborhood. Active discussions on topics anyone feels like asking about from technical issues to game rule interpretations and strategies.
• NEMO the Non-Engineering Mentor Organization is a FIRST group that discusses topical issues and develops resources in support of all those non-engineering tasks that have to get done for a team's operation - travel arrangements, fundraising, etc.
• FIRST Workshop Presentations on many topics

Many region-centric groups operate year-round. Team leader meetings occur periodically. Workshops and off-season events bring people together.

Critical Information During the Season

FIRST will send periodic email blasts out to all the Main team contacts (as listed in TIMS). These emails range from generic to very specific information that may affect you and your team. These emails carry details about deadlines, shipping, awards, scholarships, emergency work arounds. The game rules manuals will be published on FIRSTs website, but expect them to be revised and updated periodically according to Team Updates. Clarification on rules will be addressed in the FIRST Q&A forum where your team's Main Contact can post questions of your own.

• FIRST Bill's Blog - A behind-the-scenes look at FRC by the FRC Director. Posted most Wednesdays during the season and more often when interesting things happen.
• FIRST eMail Blasts - Deadline reminders plus timely links to news, information and opportunities. Sent to team main and alternate contact's email addresses as provided by teams in TIMS. Sent weekly during the season, every other week during the off season.
• FIRST Important Deadlines
• FIRST Competition Manual and Related Documents - in addition to robot and game rules you will find out about all the other non-robot awards your team can compete for.
• FIRST Team Updates - OFFICIAL changes to the game manual, often a result of discussions on the Q&A. Posted Tuesdays and Fridays during the season.
• FRC Q&A - the Game Design Committee answers questions from teams to clarify this year's game rules. Get in the habit of reading posts as they can dramatically change your idea of how the game is to be played and what is legal.
• FIRST Grants - NASA is a big source of first-year team grants. Information about these grants become available in the Fall.
• FRCTeam tweets - the FRC Director's random personal observations & blog post announcements.

Build Season

Pre-build season

• Hook up with an experienced mentor or veteran teams to find out how it all really works and just what is important and what isn’t.
• Start working immediately with your experienced mentors and mentor teams
• Get training in all aspects of FIRST robots. Borrow a past robot from a mentoring team. Tske a field trip to their shop.
• Tool up Basic Tool List, $1500 Machine Shop , $10K Machine Shop
• Collect raw materials (donations, dumpster diving, purchase):
  • Wood for practice field and prototyping
  • PVC for prototyping (pipes, connectors, glue)
  • Aluminum (flat, right-angle, c-channel, square-tube) for robot superstructure & mechanisms
  • Minimal steel for high stress joints, wheel axels (it's weight is a limiting factor
  • Nuts & bolts in a standard set of sizes, e.g., 8-32, 10-32, 1/4-20 (avoid a larger size selection as it means maintaining more stock and adds confusion)
  • Electrical wire (6 ga., 12 ga., 22 ga.)
  • Expanded pvc or similar lightweight panel for mounting electronics
  • Lexan for see-through protective covers so electronics status lights can be seen (not plexiglass)

Basic Build Schedule to get you started

Here are some practical suggestions from FIRST.

Things to Do During the Season

There are tons of jobs to get done, but there are many you can afford to skimp on as a rookie. Here are a few you shouldn't ignore:

• Robot Design & Construction
• Game Strategy
• Drive Team
• Pit Crew
• Scouting
• Marketing, Public Relations, Publicity
• Awards Committee - Only 3 teams out of 50 will take home first place trophies, so the odds are better that you can grab one of the other 20 FIRST trophies. The judges can't give you any awards if you don't let them know what you've done!
  • Judges info - entered in TIMS
  • Woodie Flowers award - you've got great teachers, advisor, mentors, so here's your chance to tell them what an effect they've had on your life. It's a short essay that only students can do. Entered at firstawards.org
  • Chairman's award - Okay, you won't win this your first year, but you need to get started and it's a great way to get focused. Entered at firstawards.org
  • Awards in general - very few teams go for them all, so pick a few to focus your efforts on and form subteams around.
    • Regional Engineering Inspiration Award
    • Autodesk Visualization Award
    • Chrysler Team Spirit Award
    • Delphi "Driving Tomorrow's Technology" Award
    • General Motors Industrial Design Award
    • Johnson & Johnson Gracious Professionalism
    • Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers Entrepreneurship Award
    • Motorola Quality Award
    • Rockwell Automation Innovation in Control Award
    • Xerox Creativity Award
    • Highest Rookie Seed Award
    • Imagery Award
    • Underwriters Laboratory Industrial Safety Award
    • Rookie All Star Award
    • Rookie Inspiration Award
    • Website Award
    • Judges Award

Major Considerations When Starting a Rookie FIRST Team

These are some things to think about. You won't have answers to all of them, and some can wait while others must be addressed right away. You'll think of a few that were left out or that apply to your unique situation. The most important thing to remember is you don't have to do it alone! Other teams have been through all of this and will love to help you get over these obstacles. After all everyone likes to give advice!

1. Budget
• Sample Budget
• Where is the majority of your funding coming from?
• Fundraising ideas
• How are you going to spend (credit card, check, etc)?
• Travel expenses

2. Support Personnel The first thung you must do is find people to delegate all these jobs to.
• Administration (if school based BOE, Principal, Dept Chairs)
• Main Advisors (teachers, etc)
• Mentors (parents, sponsor engineers)
• Boosters (parents)

3. Facilities
• Where are you going to meet for preseason?
• Where are you going to build?
• Do you have access to fabrication machinery, i.e. lathe, mill, TIG, CNC, waterjet…
• Do you need keys/special access?

4. Suppliers
• Where are you going to get parts – having local suppliers is ideal
• Are there local companies who would be willing to donate supplies – a great way to create community synergy

5. Recruitment
• Set Info Session Dates
• Bring in other teams to demo robot to potential recruits
• Start with an active meeting, free food, etc
• Teacher support/help in recruiting
• Emphasis on women/minorities/etc
• Recruiting parents and unattached mentors is just as important as recruiting students
• Do you have local engineers or machinists who are willing to help out, retirees are a great source of mentors.

6. Schedule Develop a schedule for preseason, build season, competitions, community events. See the sample at the bottom of this page.
• Officer meetings
• booster club meetings
• Events for fundraising, recruiting, community outreach such as parades & homecoming
• Weekly team meetings – preseason
  • Use preseason for teambuilding & learning
  • Other teams can help do presentations/activities
  • See if you can go to an offseason competition
• How many times to meet during build season? (6 weeks)
  • Official meetings
  • Unofficial times
• Are you going to supply food at meetings?

7. Team Structure
• Subteams (non-robot also)
• Student leadership?
• Mentor structure?
• FIRST Roles (main, alternate, shipping, teacher, etc)
• Sign up in TIMS

8. Parent Boosters
• Support logistics -- food, fundraising, travel arrangements, chaperones
• Parents who are engineers are an amazing resource
• Get them involved EARLY

9. Team Image/Uniforms
• Develop an image early, team name, uniform, chant/cheer, mascot
• Arrange for Tshirt printing, Buttons, Sweatshirts, etc.

10. Team Communication
• What is your main form of Communication?
• Email, PA announcements, phone, Instant Messaging, flyers, meetings

At the Event

All FIRST Robotics Competition events follow a 3-day pattern spelled out in the Tournament section of the game rules.
(Note: Michigan events operate on a unique 2-day schedule)

• Thursday - Check-in/Setup pit-Unpack robot/Practice/Inspection/Final fixes/Driver's Meeting
• Friday - Opening Ceremonies/Qualification matches/Judges Awards
• Saturday - Morning: Opening Ceremonies/Qualification matches
  • Noon: Alliance Picking
  • Afternoon: Elimination rounds/closing Ceremonies/Judges & Competition Awards
  Packup tools and ship robot home

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