Team 461: Piecing Together Our Future

Robotics are an integral part of FIRST, but the Chairman's Award is even more important. It is the soul of FIRST, the place for teams to show off their success in spreading the message of science and technology to society at large. It highlights team successes in non-technical areas and also shows teams' growth.

The Chairman's Award submission for 2009 was themed around the idea of a puzzle.  The differences of our team bring us together.  It focused on varying levels of experience from high school students to college mentors and/or alumni to professional engineers and teachers. Since 2009 marks our tenth year, we organized a reunion where alumni came from across the country to meet with their former teammates and learn how the team has grown since their participation. Members of WBI involve themselves in a diverse array of activities outside of FIRST which helps our team grow as a whole from their experiences. More than this though, we believe in giving back to FIRST and the community.  Through educating the community of FIRST's vision, we have helped start many teams and have sparked an interest in the young and old alike.  All of these things and many more have helped shape team 461 and these things bring us together to make a well-working team.