Urgent!!  Volunteers needed for events the next two weekends! 

We are still in need of volunteers for our FLL Qualifiers happening in December! We are especially in need of adults to fill judging roles. If you are a coach or mentor, judging at an event other than where your students are competing is an amazing way to learn about the process and how to coach your students on exactly what they need to do in their presentation to judges.  

We also need students in various roles – referee, scorekeeper, queuer, and field reset. This is a great way for students to meet their volunteer hour requirement! Here are the events with the greatest need: 

December 6: Beaver Lake, Everett, Seattle, Spokane, and Wapato 

December 7: Everett, Seattle, Spokane, and Wapato 

December 13: Federal Way and Shoreline 

December 14: Federal Way, Shoreline, Tacoma, Oak Harbor, and Olympia 

If you are able to help, click here to find an event near you: Search Event 

Invoices have been sent 

Invoices were sent to the contact listed on the FIRST Washington registration form on Friday, 11-21.  If you did not receive an invoice, please reach out to our finance department at accounting@firstwa.org. 

Reminder, the deadline to secure your registration is Friday, December 12.  You can secure your registration with a PO or by paying with a check or credit card. 

Slides and recording from the November 18 coaches chat have been posted 

If you missed the coaches chat (which most of you did because it was VERY lightly attended 😊 ) be sure to check out the slides and recording here:  https://firstwa.org/webinars/  Remember, you are responsible to know this information. 

Workshops/Quiet Room at events 

Workshops 

Workshops are great at events but take extra work.  If you are interested in hosting a workshop, please fill out this form The deadline to submit for a workshop is February 6. 

Quiet Room 

We had lots of people asking us about quiet rooms last year.  FIRST Washington is unable to manage quiet room sign ups at events.  Volunteers do need to sign up for the role through their firstinspires dashboard to make sure they have passed youth protection screening.  Many adults enjoy taking a shift in the quiet room to give them a break from the noise and craziness of the event! 

Please consider hosting the quiet room, we are happy to work with you and give you contact info for the folks to sign up.  Fill out this form if you’re willing to be a quiet room host for an event. 

Accommodations at events (accessibility not hotel accommodations) 

In the PNW, we work VERY hard to make sure everyone has a great experience at our events. 

We are aware of the needs at some of our events, but if you don’t tell us, we may not be aware of your team’s need. Please fill out this form to let us know if your team needs any accommodations. The earlier you fill out the form, the more likely we will be able to accommodate your request. Understand, we may not be able to accommodate everyone’s needs. We are a small organization and venues vary. Please be gracious and kind if we can’t exactly meet your need the way you would like. The earlier you make us aware of a need, the greater chance we may be able to make an accommodation. 

Important Dates

Event & Kickoff Registration Closes Today! 

We still have a few spots we need to fill at SunDome.  Please consider going to SunDome for a 3rd play.  I will waive the 3rd play registration fee! 

You DON’T have to secure your registration by November 18.  FIRST Washington will secure your registration for you and then will send you an invoice for the FIRST and PNW FRC District Fees either by the end of this week or the week of November 24th. 

FIRST Choice and Virtual Kit of Parts 

I have been getting a lot of questions about FIRST Choice and the Virtual Kit of Parts.  Here are a few things you need to know: 

• If you don’t know what FIRST Choice and the Virtual KoP is, you can find more information here:  https://community.firstinspires.org/first-choice-and-virtual-kit-of-parts-have-launched-for-the-2025-season  

• Your team needs to be secured with FIRST HQ in order to access both of these 

• Your teams are not yet secured with FIRST HQ (We will talk a bit more about the timing of things on our coaches chat tonight) 

• Teams will be secured with FIRST HQ by the end of the week, then you should be able to access these tools. 

FRC Coaches Chat

Recording and slides from the November 18th coaches chat will be posted here soon! 

Important Dates

Third Play Registration is open!

We have had very few teams sign up for a 3rd play this season.  We need teams at SunDome so please consider signing up for a 3rd play at SunDome and we will waive the registration fee!!! 

You may end up on a waitlist when registering for a 3rd play event but I will be checking registrations regularly throughout the week and will move your team into your event if you end up on the waitlist.  Right now, I am only moving teams into the SunDome and Sammamish events.  Once SunDome has 28 teams, then I will consider 3rd plays at other events.   

Kickoff and Event Registration Closes Tuesday, November 18! 

Event and Kickoff Registration closes next Tuesday.  What that means: 

• Make sure you are registered for the kickoff you plan to attend.   

• If you are registered as a MySite, make sure you understand what that means 

• Your kit will ship the week after kickoff 

• You will be charged shipping (last year we included it on your invoice and that is our hope for this year) 

• If you want a 3rd play (we need more teams at SunDome) you need to register before next Tuesday 

You DON’T have to secure your registration by November 18.  FIRST Washington will secure your registration for you and then will send you an invoice for the FIRST and PNW FRC District Fees the week of November 24th. 

Next FRC Coaches Chat is Tuesday, November 18 at 7:00 pm 

Last month, we focused on how to become a 501c3, On this coaches chat we have invited our President, Fred Krug and Development Director, Lila Mowatt to join us and talk about fundraising. 

We will also go over the invoicing schedule, what will be on the invoices and how they will be sent.   

Make sure to have 1 adult attend! 

Click here for the meeting link 

Important Dates

Third Play Registration is open!

Right now, we are only allowing 3rd plays at both week 3 events: 

• SunDome March 19-21 

• Sammamish March 20-22 

To help fill our SunDome event, FIRST Washington is offering free 3rd plays at SunDome.   

Once SunDome and Sammamish have enough teams at their events, we may open up 3rd play options at other events (Oregon State Fair, Glacier Peak & Wilsonville) but we will not open 3rd play options at these events until Sammamish and SunDome have enough teams to be viable events. 

You may end up on a waitlist when registering for a 3rd play event but I will be checking registrations regularly throughout the week and will move your team into SunDome or Sammamish if you end up on a waitlist for one of those events. 

Boeing Grant is open! 

The grant is open October 20 through November 14th or until all funds are exhausted.  If you have a Boeing Mentor, I encourage you all to apply early for 2 reasons: 

• To ensure you are allocated funding before it runs out (this happened to many of our FRC teams a few years ago) 

• With the grant opening so late, to ensure your funding has been allocated prior to event registration closing.  When we do invoices, we have to apply grant funding based on how FIRST has applied those funds.  If your Boeing funds don’t show as applied on FIRST’s end when we invoice, they will not show on your FIRST Washington invoice.  You will have to wait until FIRST opens their regrant window and will have to request a regrant to access those funds. 

Your Boeing Mentor should have access to the grant through an internal system. 

Next FRC Coaches Chat is Tuesday, November 18 at 7:00 pm 

Last month, we focused on how to become a 501c3, On this coaches chat we have invited our President, Fred Krug and Development Director, Lila Mowatt to join us and talk about fundraising. 

We will also go over the invoicing schedule, what will be on the invoices and how they will be sent.   

Make sure to have 1 adult attend! 

Click here for the meeting link 

Important Dates

Slides and recording form 10-23 coaches chat are posted 

If you missed the coaches chat last week or would just like to view the recording or slides, you can find them here:   https://firstwa.org/webinars/  

Volunteer with FTC! 

All our Washington FTC events are live and accepting volunteer applications. Register today!  

Volunteering at your local FTC events is a great way to support your local pipeline of future FRC students.  

FTC leagues are looking for Scoring Referees, Penalty Referees, Lead Scorekeepers and more!  

Judging starts at the Interleague level. Interested? Sign up today from your dashboard! 

FRC Workshops hosted by SOTABots 2557

The SOTAbots are hosting an FRC Workshop November 15 (Saturday). 

• The workshop is at IDEA High School: 6701 S. Park Ave, Tacoma, WA 98408 
• The workshop will be from 9:00 AM until 3:00 PM (Though if there are enough teams and sessions, the hours could be extended) 
• The workshop is free and open to all teams.  
• If a team would like to teach a lesson (or two) at the workshop, please indicate by using the appropriate link below! 

  We would like teams to let us know if they are attending and how many team members they are planning to bring so we can plan accordingly. 

  Here are some links for the workshop: 

  Use this link to verify your team’s planned attendance: 

Planed Attendance Link: https://forms.gle/Ey8xbjSvf7r6VD2U7 

Use this link to pre-order lunches (not mandatory, but encouraged): 

Lunch Link: https://forms.gle/a7tFaL8Vj7to824E6 

Use this link if your team wants to teach a class at the workshop: 

Presentation Proposal Link https://forms.gle/AXGbsaaz5vrDjf9u7 

If you have questions, reach out to Rich Williams RWILLI4@Tacoma.K12.Wa.US  

Boeing Grant is open! 

The grant is open October 20 through November 14th or until all funds are exhausted.  If you have a Boeing Mentor, I encourage you all to apply early for 2 reasons: 

• To ensure you are allocated funding before it runs out (this happened to many of our FRC teams a few years ago) 

• With the grant opening so late, to ensure your funding has been allocated prior to event registration closing.  When we do invoices, we have to apply grant funding based on how FIRST has applied those funds.  If your Boeing funds don’t show as applied on FIRST’s end when we invoice, they will not show on your FIRST Washington invoice.  You will have to wait until FIRST opens their regrant window and will have to request a regrant to access those funds. 

Your Boeing Mentor should have access to the grant through an internal system. 

Important Dates

Boeing Grant is open! 

The grant is open October 20 through November 14th or until all funds are exhausted. If you have a Boeing Mentor, I encourage you all to apply early for 2 reasons: 

1. To ensure you are allocated funding before it runs out (this happened to many of our FRC teams a few years ago)

    

2. With the grant opening so late, to ensure your funding has been allocated prior to event registration closing.  When we do invoices, we have to apply grant funding based on how FIRST has applied those funds.  If your Boeing funds don’t show as applied on FIRST’s end when we invoice, they will not show on your FIRST Washington invoice.  You will have to wait until FIRST opens their regrant window and will have to request a regrant to access those funds. 

Your Boeing Mentor should have access to the grant through an internal system. 

Next FRC Coaches Chat, 7 PM Thursday, October 23 

Our next coaches chat is scheduled for this Thursday, October 23 at 7:00 pm.  Please make sure to have one coach attend if possible. 

We are trying something new this season and will have a guest presenter  October, November and December coaches chats.   

For this chat, we have asked Emil from 2928 to do a presentation talking about how to become a 501c3 

I will still be going over critical information during this meeting as well so again, plese make sure to have one adult attend. 

Click here for the meeting link. 

Second round of preferencing closes at 9 am Thursday 

To preference for your second event, both coaches must have passed youth protection screening and signed consents so if you were able to preference during the first round (which all of you were!) Do not change coaches unless your new coach is through screening.   

A few things to note about your second round of preferencing: 

• Teams are no longer guaranteed their home event.  If you did not pick your home event during the first round of preferencing, you are no longer guaranteed space at that event. 

• Just like the first round of preferencing, the window will close next Thursday at 9 am.  You can pick your preferences any time during that window.  I recommend that you make sure you have entered your preferences by Wednesday evening. 

According to an email from FIRST this morning, most of you have not submitted your preferences for your second event yet.  Don’t wait until the last minute, make sure they are submitted today! 

Important Dates