This judged award is given to the team that most connected with their local community and the engineering community. A true FIRST team is more than a sum of its parts, and recognizes that their schools and communities play an essential part to their success. The recipient of this award is recognized for helping the community understand FIRST, the FIRST Tech Challenge, and the team itself. The team that wins this award is aggressively seeking engineers and exploring the opportunities available in the world of engineering, science and technology.  In addition, this team has a clear fundraising goal and plan to achieve that goal.

Guidelines for the Connect Award

• Team provides clear examples of outreach to community
• Team has worked to develop an in‐person or a virtual connection with the engineering, science or technology community
• Team has a business plan or other way of determining their fundraising needs and a plan to achieve theirfundraising goal
• Team has a plan to give back to their community

This award celebrates innovation and intellectual property creation inspired by the FIRST season experience.  This award recognizes creativity in effectively solving a real-world, complex problem through the invention of a unique solution beyond the requirements of the FIRST competition season and events. This award directly links to theFIRST mission to inspire young people to be science and technology leaders that inspire innovation and to theFIRST vision to transform the culture by creating a world where science and technology are celebrated.

The FIRST Future Innovator Award will be judged by a panel of leading experts in the fields of engineering and patent law, including Dean Kamen, President of DEKA Research & Development Corporation and inventor of the Segway Personal Transporter, and representatives from Abbott and others, to determine the winning idea.

The winner will be announced at the FIRST Championship in St. Louis, Missouri, April 24-27, 2013.  The winning students will be granted an award presented by the Abbott Fund and also will have the opportunity to meet with a venture capitalist firm for a real-world experience to discuss their invention and possible business application.

The FIRST Future Innovator Award competition is open to all North American FRC and FTC teams officially registered for the current 2012-2013 FIRST competition season. The portal for student submissions opened November 8, 2012 and the deadline for submissions will be Noon EST, February 21, 2013.

This judged award celebrates the team that exemplifies the essence of the FIRST Tech Challenge competition through team spirit and enthusiasm. They show their spirit through costumes and fun outfits, a team cheer or outstanding spirit. This team has also made a collective effort to make FIRST known throughout their school and community.

Guidelines for the Motivate Award

• Team spirit is consistent throughout the team and the competition.
• Team is enthusiastic
• The team functions well as a team
• Team enthusiasm is evident in their community outreach

This judged award recognizes design elements of the robot that are both functional and aesthetic. All successful robots have innovative design aspects; however, the PTC Design Award is presented to teams that incorporate industrial design elements into their solution. These design elements could simplify the robot’s appearance by giving it a clean look, be decorative in nature, or otherwise express the creativity of the team. The winning design should not compromise the practical operation of the robots but complement its purpose. This award is sponsored by Parametric Technology Corporation (PTC), developers of the CAD tools, Creo and Mathcad. PTC gives licenses to the FTC student teams for these software products to help them with their designs. Use of these tools is not required to be eligible, however, teams that use them in their design are given extra consideration for this award.

Guidelines for the PTC Design Award

• Team must submit an Engineering Notebook with detailed robot design drawings
• Robot differentiates itself from others
• Design is both aesthetic and functional
• Well thought out basis for the design (why i.e. inspiration, function, etc.)

Promote Award

This judged award is being piloted for the 2011-2012 season and may not be given at all tournaments. Please contact your tournament organizer to determine if it will be given at an event you attend.

The Promote Award is given to the team that is most successful in creating a compelling video message for the public designed to change our culture and celebrate science, technology, engineering and math.

Guidelines for the Promote Award

• Team must present a thoughtful and high-quality video which appeals to the general public.
• Strong production value is important, but the message and impact of the video are of greater weight for the judges.
• Creativity in interpreting the annually assigned theme is desired.
• Submissions for this award will be considered for the Inspire Award but are not required.

Winning videos will be submitted to FIRST and used to promote the higher values of the FIRST Tech Challenge. Teams may win the Promote Award only once at a Championship level event and only once at a qualifying level event.

Team must submit a one-minute long PSA video one full week prior to the event to be eligible for this award. Additional submissions are welcome but will not be eligible for awards.

Rockwell Collins Innovate Award

The Rockwell Collins Innovate Award celebrates a team that not only thinks outside the box, but also has the ingenuity and inventiveness to make their designs come to life. This judged award is given to the team that has the most innovative and creative robot design solution to any or all specific field elements or components in the FIRST Tech Challenge game. Elements of this award include elegant design, robustness, and ‘out of the box’ thinking related to design. This award may address the design of the whole robot, or of a sub‐assembly attached to the robot. The creative component must work consistently, but a robot does not have to work all the time during matches to be considered for this award. The team’s Engineering Notebook should be marked with journal entries to show the design of the component(s) and the team’s robot in order to be eligible for this award, and entries should describe succinctly how the team arrived at that solution.

Guidelines for the Rockwell Collins Innovate Award.

• Robot or robot sub‐assembly must be elegant and unique in its design
• Creative component must work reliably
• Team must submit an Engineering Notebook
• Robot is stable, robust and controllable
• Robot design is efficient and consistent with team plan and strategy

Think Award

This judged award is given to the team that best reflects the “journey” the team took as they experienced the engineering design process during the build season. The Engineering Notebook is the key reference for judges to help identify the most deserving team. The team’s Engineering Notebook should focus on the design and build stage of the team’s robot. Journal entries of interest to judges for this award will include those describing the steps, brainstorms, designs, re‐designs, successes, and those ‘interesting moments’ when things weren’t going as planned. A team will not be a candidate for this award if they have not completed the section of the Engineering Notebook describing the team’s experience.

Guidelines for the Think Award

• Team must submit an Engineering Notebook
• Engineering Notebook must demonstrate that the team has a clear understanding of the engineeringdesign process, with pictures or drawings and details documenting all stages of robot design
• Engineering Notebook must be organized and follow the formatting guidelines provided by FIRST
• Collaboration and co‐ownership are dominant themes in the Engineering Notebook or in the judges interview

Note: Teams should review Section 5: Engineering Notebooks for a complete description and format
specifications.

Performance-based Awards

 

These awards are given to the top teams, and their alliance partners, at a tournament. 

Finalist Alliance Award

This award will be given to the finalist alliance represented in the final match of the competition, usually consisting of three teams.

 

 

Winning Alliance Award

This award will be given to the winning alliance represented in the final match of the competition, usually three teams.

Special Awards

FIRST® Tech Challenge currently has one special award, the Compass Award.  It recognizes an outstanding coach or mentor.

Compass Award

This is a pilot award and may not be available at all tournaments.  Please contact your tournament's organizer to determine if this award will be given.

A FIRST Tech Challenge team is about more than building robots, and competing at tournaments ‐ it is a journey to a destination through trial and error, success and failure, with challenging new technology and obstacles to navigate where no road maps are provided. So how does a team find their way? 

The Compass Award recognizes an adult coach or mentor who has provided outstanding guidance and support for a team throughout the year. The winner of the Compass Award will be determined from candidates nominated by FTC team members, via a 40‐60 second video submission, highlighting how their mentor has helped them become a champion team. We want to hear what sets your mentor apart.

Guidelines for the Compass Award

• Only one video submission per team will be considered. Teams may submit new or updated videos ateach tournament.
• The video must be submitted at least one week prior to tournament day. Instructions for submittingvideos will be released after Kickoff on the www.usfirst.org website.
• Videos must not be longer than 60 seconds (including introduction and credits if you choose to use them).
• Videos must be submitted in AVI, WMV or MOV format. Remember that the winning video may be shownon a large screen during the awards ceremony. Use the best resolution you have available for your finalversion.
• Video presentations are confidential, and may not be made public or shared with other teams prior to theaward presentation.
• Team must submit an Engineering Notebook.

Judges Award

During the course of the competition, the judging panel may encounter a team whose unique efforts, performance or dynamics merit recognition, yet doesn’t fit into any of the existing award categories. To recognize these unique teams, FIRST offers a “blank” judges award. The judging panel may select a team to be honored, as well as the name of the judges award.