You are receiving this e-mail because you are a coach or an assistant coach for an FTC-Iowa team.
(Have you missed a FTC-Iowa Team Blast? An archive of these messages are located on our blog: http://ftc-iowa.blogspot.com/)
We hope the winter break treated you and your team well. (Also, we secretly hope you were able to meet with your team during the break as well.)
1. December/Early January Monthly Status Report
2. Scholarship Opportunities
3. Scrimmage Information
4. FTC Forums
5. Seeking volunteers for Tournament
6. Helpful Hints to FCS Success and Samantha Mounting Guidelines
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1. December/Early January Monthly Status Report
Please take a few minutes to complete the December/Early January monthly status report. It can be found at:
https://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?hl=en&formkey=dDgzcktrTjhldTROMFBjX0dRRy00bXc6MA#gid=0
This report will be open until Tuesday, Jan. 11th.
Remember, if you are a coach for multiple teams, please submit one report for each team.
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2. Scholarship Opportunities
Did you know by participating in FIRST, students qualify for scholarships that they otherwise would not get access to? This season, over 128 organizations are offering 853 scholarships worth over $14 million! That's a lot of financial aid to FIRST students! Check it out at: http://usfirst.org/aboutus/scholarships.aspx
The University of Iowa College of Engineering is also very pleased to be able to offer FIRST scholarships as well. New for this season, the UI College of Engineering will be offering multiple scholarships to students, each worth a total of $16,000! Please encourage your students to apply, as the deadline is January 31, 2011. Information about these scholarships can be found at: http://www.engineering.uiowa.edu/sdc/scholarships/ECE-first.php
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3. Scrimmage Information
On Saturday, we will be hosting our second scrimmage of the season. We are very excited to see the progression of the teams.
A few things to keep in mind:
- Scrimmages have capacities, and for some scrimmages, capacities have been met. It is important for your team to register to attend a scrimmage (https://sites.google.com/site/ftciowacoaches/project-definition/Events)
- During a scrimmage, we will be inspecting robots and running matches. Please be prepared for an inspection and running matches.
- Many of these sites are hosting a scrimmage as a nice gesture. Please encourage your team members to be respectful of the hosts' property and their time.
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4. FTC Forums
Does your team have a specific question about a game rule? Does your team need help with the engineering notebook, want more information about the awards or wonder what happens during inspections? Does your team have questions about Samantha? If you answered any of these, then please check out the FTC Forums (http://ftcforum.usfirst.org/)
The Forums is THE official place to go for answers to your questions. Also, did you know that you can print information from the forums? Check it out!
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5. Seeking volunteers for Tournament
As you may know, volunteers are the heart of FTC. Volunteers are critical to the success of a tournament. We are currently seeking volunteers for the FTC-Iowa Championship tournament on Feb. 25/26. If you know of any parents who are planning to attend the tournament, we'd love to have them help out! Please encourage all interested person to sign up at: https://sites.google.com/site/ftciowa/volunteers
An e-mail address has been set up for any correspondence about volunteering. ftc.iowa.volunteer@gmail.com
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6. Helpful Hints to FCS Success and Samantha Mounting Guidelines
Attached are two very important documents. Please review them as they have helpful of information in the contents.
If you are interested in purchasing a router to help with your Samantha module, we found a great deal at Tiger Direct: http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=6747454&Sku=L48-2771
(Please note, we are not requiring teams to purchase this particular product from this vendor, but found this deal and wanted to pass it onto the teams.
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Thank you, coaches, and please do not hesitate to ask if you have any questions.
Rebecca Whitaker & FTC-Iowa team
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