Charged Up Coach Email Volume 6: 9-27-22 – Fill out the FIRST Washington Registration form by Friday!

Greetings Coaches!

If you are new to this email this is the place where you will find all of the Pacific NW District specific FIRST Robotics Competition information. Coaches in the FIRST system for the current season will be added once teams are able to register for events. Every email from me will be numbered and that number lets you know which update it is, if you miss an update you can find it on our website.

Here is what I have for you today:

• Preferencing window closes this Thursday at 9:00 am
• Many teams are still not event ready
• Slides and recording FRC Coaches Chat Sept 22nd
• Fill out the PNW Registration form by Sept 30 to be considered for a grant
• OSPI grant closes 10-3 (WA Public Schools only)
• OR Girl’s Gen Info
• Onshape training with Kevin every Tuesday & Wednesday

 

Preferencing window closes Thursday at 9:00 am

Over 1/3 of our teams still need to preference for their first round of events.  You still have time but make sure you have your preferences filled out by Wednesday night.  Yes, preferencing doesn’t close until Thursday morning but lower your stress level and have it taken care of by Wednesday night.

What does this mean for teams?

For the first round of preferencing you have 2 options:

1. You can pick your home event – You are guaranteed a spot in your home event so if you plan to attend that event, select it and don’t select any other event options and you will be placed into that event.
2. You can select an event that is not your home event and rank your preferences if you have alternates in case your first choice is full or select to be put on the waiting list for a specific event if there is not room.

Here is a guide that helps to explain how event preferencing works.

The 1st event preferencing window closes at 9 am on Thursday, Sept 29. Teams should be notified of their event placement by the end of the day on Friday, Sept 30.

Many teams are still not event ready!

In order to select your preferences during the first preferencing window, your lead and alternated contacts must have signed their consent forms and be through youth protection screening. Screening generally only takes a few days but with all 3 programs registering this time of year, it can take much longer. Please log into your dashboard on firstinspires.org and check to make sure your ypp is current.

Additionally, you will want to stay event ready until the preferencing process (for all events) is complete. Now is not the time to make a coaching change unless they have passed youth protection screening and signed their consent forms.

Slides and recording are posted on firstwa.org

For those of you who missed our coaches chat last week, you can find the slide deck and recording here:  https://firstwa.org/first-robotics-competition/resources/workshops-webinars/

Fill out the PNW Registration form by THIS FRIDAY 9-30 to be considered for a grant

Only about 1/3 of our teams have filled out the FIRST Washington registration form. All teams (WA, OR & AK) need to fill out this form!

Any team planning to compete in the Pacific Northwest District needs to fill out our registration form. If you are interested in receiving a grant, you will need to complete the form prior to September 30. Here is the link to the registration form. Please fill it out early so you don’t

forget! https://app.smartsheet.com/b/form/fef251a315a44f02ad73abc987b3f63b

If you aren’t sure if you have completed the form, you can see the list of teams who have registered wtih firstwa here:  https://firstwa.org/first-robotics-competition/

OSPI Grant is open – Washington public school teams only. Grant deadline Oct 3rd

The OSPI grant is open and will close on October 3rd. If you are a Washington public school, be sure to coordinate with the Administrator in your school who is responsible for filling out (or approving) the grant. We learned from OSPI that there were some schools who did not fully fill out the grant in the past few years and therefore were unable to be considered for funding. Be sure to answer all questions completely. Remember FIRST Washington grants show up on your invoice so you will not know what those grants are before the deadline but every team that registers with FIRST Washington by the grant deadline who is interested in a grant will receive funding from FIRST Washington Donors.

Info on Girls Gen, OR

We are excited to see you at Girls’ Generation

·       Sat, Oct 15, 2022 at Wilsonville HS.

Please submit this registration form for your team(s). We will need a minimum of 16 teams to hold this event, and the usual small army of volunteers. We will follow the COVID protocol of the venue. Masks are welcome; we’ll provide KN95 masks for volunteers.

We have invited FLL and FTC teams to come out and cheer. Do you have ideas to celebrate girls in STEM? Please let us know!

Onshape with Kevin every Tuesday & Wednesday

Onshape CAD Tuesday with Kevin (Tuesdays 7pm to 8:30pm)

Onshape CAD Wednesday with Kevin (Wednesday 6:30pm to 8:00pm)

Online help learning about CAD using Onshape. This 90 minute session will help get you started and help solve your CAD issues using Onshape. Many of the techniques will apply to other CAD programs as well, but this one will specifically use Onshape. Learn about assemblies, importing parts from vendors like Rev Robotics and AndyMark, modifying parts, creating your own parts for 3D printing, and working with a team on a project. Onshape is free for every FIRST participant and runs on a wide array of hardware because it is web based. You will, however, want a three button mouse. Specifically, a mouse with a left and right button plus a center scrolling mouse button. You can get one for about $6 from Amazon prime. CAD programs work very poorly on laptops with finger pads (trackpads).

Onshape CAD will be applicable to both FTC and FRC. All are welcome.

 

The first week (9/13 and 9/14) both days will focus on getting you and your team setup to use Onshape in an efficient way, demos on what the program does, and a tour of where to find the tutorials and which ones to start with. I expect that 9/14 will be mostly a repeat of 9/13.

All of these meetings start on 9/13/2022 and will be each week until December 14th. They all use the following Zoom link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82913817510?pwd=SEZPeC9UQmk2dkpWRFFsaXdkaWxvdz09

Meeting ID: 829 1381 7510

Passcode: NerdyTalk

We will make every attempt to record and upload these sessions to Youtube each week. Check our FIRST Washington Youtube channel and the ‘with Kevin’ playlist.