I'll be off site tomorrow

Good Afternoon Teams,

Thank you to everyone who responded to last week’s call for Beta Teams.  58 applications have been collected so far and there is room for more.  The deadline is Friday Sept 2nd at noon EST so get your application in.  We’ve started to review the choices, but won’t make any decisions until after the deadline.  Teams will be notified on Sept 16th and will have to sign a disclosure statement right away. I’ll keep you updated.

For those of you who asked, Frank has an update on the cRIO FRCII.

• The last day to purchase the original FRC cRIO is Friday, Sept 30th.  8 slot controller with 2x 9201, 2x 9403 and 1x 9472 modules $750 at the FRC discounted price.
• The new cRIO FRCII may be ordered by teams starting Monday, Oct 3rd.  4 slot controller with 1x 9201, 1x 9403 and 1x 9472 modules $525 at the FRC discounted price.  Chassis only (no modules) $285 at the FRC discounted price. Initial deliveries will ship either late November or early December.  
• NI will give registered FRC teams one Discount Credit each calendar year.  The FRC discount may be used to purchase the new cRIO FRCII kit (with modules), the chassis only (no modules) or both (1kit plus one chassis) as long as the items are purchased in a single order.
• FRC teams that were registered for the 2011 season may use the 2011 discount right away.  Teams that register for the 2012 season may use the 2012 discount starting Oct 3, 2011.  Teams that consume both credits will not be able to order additional FRC discounted hardware until Jan 1, 2013.  Discount credits may not be carried forward.  (Teams may, however, order additional original cRIOs and cRIO FRCIIs at an educational discount price.)
• Call 1-866-511-6285 to order
• Software for programming the new cRIO FRCII will not be available until kickoff.  Beta teams will be testing this software starting in September.
• Teams may continue to use the original FRC cRIO in competition this year.

The Supplier Summit went very well. FRC teams 151 Tough Techs, 811 Cardinals, 1058 PVC Pirates and 1517 The Lumberjacks came out to give our guests a chance to operate LOGO MOTION robots, the Deans’ List Winners stopped in to answer the supplier’s questions from a student/team point of view and Kate and Collin collected a great deal of feedback.  I expect some great new ideas and opportunities will come out of the day and a half long event.   I enjoyed the chance to talk to a number of suppliers and had an interesting conversation with NI about the benefits and challenges of wrapping the new cRIO FRCII in shrink wrap.  My thanks to everyone who helped make the summit possible.

Local teams demo their robots and discuss their designs with suppliers 

Representatives from Microsoft, Intel, Gates Corporation and Grainger deep in discussion

The Dean’s List Winners met with Dean last week and he asked them to round up missing FIRST Alumni.  They’ve started a FIRST Alumni Facebook page  Be sure to tell your team members and alumni.   I enjoyed the chance to talk with the Dean’s list  winners.  They had some very interesting and insightful comments that I plan to take back to the GDC.

Boys Latin School of Maryland takes its FRC team 2534The Lakers seriously enough to honor their Regional win.

This photo warms my heart.

FIRST President, Jon Dudas is in the running to speak at the next South by Southwest conference  You can vote for his panel “Building the Next Generation of Innovators” here.  Deadline Sept 2nd.

137 days until Kickoff
See you then!