FIRST Robotics Competition
What is the FIRST Robotics Competition?
The FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) combines the excitement of sport with science and technology. It creates a unique varsity sport for the mind by challenging teams to design, build and test a new robot for each season’s competition in only six weeks. The robot is designed to participate in a 2-minute, 30-second match as one of three alliance robots that compete against another 3 robot alliance. The robots must meet specific criteria of weight, size, and safety, while incorporating cutting-edge technology in its mechanical, electrical, pneumatic, and control systems, all driven by state-of-the-art software and hardware. All parts of the robot and the engineering process are student led and completed, and with mentor aid, teaches students about engineering through real world experiences.
What does FRC Involve?
The FRC season begins with the kickoff event in early January. This presentation originates in New Hampshire and is simulcast to dozens of locations throughout the world. Brophy Prep in Phoenix traditionally hosts this event for Arizona teams. At the kickoff, FIRST leaders present the competition for the new season, explain some of the rules and limitations, provide a few suggestions for success in the competition, and provide the code that unlocks the secret documentation that details the game requirements and scoring. Along with the other teams in attendance, we will then receive our kit of parts and excitedly begin the game and design strategy planning. For the next six weeks, we will design, strategize, sweat, toil, laugh, cry, question, debate, drill, cut, program, model, assemble, disassemble, reassemble, test, and a million other things as we race to complete the design, build, and test the robot in time to package it up and get it ready to ship to our first regional event.
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