What happens on a FIRST team?
Each season introduces a new challenge. Teams study the rules, brainstorm strategies, design and build solutions, write code, test repeatedly, document their work, and prepare to share it at events. Mentors guide the process while students make meaningful decisions and own the result.
The three programs
FIRST LEGO League uses LEGO-based tools and themed challenges to introduce engineering and coding. FIRST Tech Challenge teams design and program more advanced robots for a head-to-head game. FIRST Robotics Competition brings high-school teams together to build larger robots under demanding technical and organizational constraints.
You do not have to be “a robotics person”
Teams need builders and programmers, but they also need writers, presenters, designers, organizers, photographers, fundraisers, and strategists. Students can enter through a strength they already have and develop new ones during the season.
Competition is only part of the experience
Events create energy and deadlines, but the deeper value is the process: learning to respond to failure, communicate under pressure, accept feedback, and improve as a group. Those habits transfer to school, work, and community leadership.