Getting Started
Team
1713 began in October 2005, in an assembly led by 8-year
veteran FIRST coach Mrs. Maureen Menton and her husband
Roy. The successful attempt at recruiting Thousand
Islands students ready to have “the hardest fun they’d
ever had” attracted over 40 students from eight through
twelfth grade to the new, then-nameless team. In the
next meeting, the
entire team
assembled to establish a name, motto, and logo.
Combining the computer-lingo translation of the district
name with one of the many “robot-sounding” words
suggested by the team produced the phrase K-Island
Gears, the new team name. Contributing to the gears
motif were the motto (“Let’s Roll!”) and the logo:
a lighthouse with 1713 written vertically, with a gear
in the background, designed by then-member Mark Bowman.
Stan Bach, an experienced leader with a position as
middle school student council president in his résumé
was made student leader of the team.
A unique
team from the beginning, the K-Island Gears has worked
under a
business-like structure
from the start. While many teams consist solely of
robot-builders, with a few other students working with
the website and coordinating the business aspect of
running a FIRST team, team 1713 is divided into many
sub-teams. At the start of the 2005-2006 season, it
consisted of a build/design/game & drive team, a Public
Relations team, a safety team, the business division,
and a travel team. The safety team was quickly dropped,
and safety responsibilities
were given to all teams instead. Taking its place was
the graphic design team. Not long after, the
build/design team split from game & drive. These
divisions remained in place until the start of the next
season.
Taking Care of Business
By no
means willing to do anything halfway, the team’s adult
coordinators worked side-by-side with the student
captains and business team toward the goal of getting as
many sponsors
as possible. A NASA grant put the K-Island Gears off to
a great start, and the local Rotary Club cheerfully made
a generous donation as well. Verizon soon became the
first corporate sponsor for the team. The donation was
such that team 1713 decided to name their first robot
Owen, after Verizon division president T.P. Owens. Key
Bank, the Clayton Lions Club, and the Development
Authority of the North Country donated to the team soon
after. New York Air Brake’s engineers became mentors to
the design/build team, and local business Don’s Prop
Shop provided the team with additional parts not
provided by the initial kit. Before the 2006 season had
even begun, the K-Island Gears seemed to have all
necessary “parts” in place.
The Rookie
Season
On
January 6, 2006, six representatives of the K-Island
Gears assembled alongside other teams at the Rochester
Institute of Technology to witness the unveiling of the
game in which they were all about to participate. They
came back to Thousand Islands anxious to show to their
team the new game: Aim High. A video showcasing the
complex basketball-soccer hybrid was presented to the
team as a whole a few days later. Any member who was
previously oblivious to it was now fully aware that
there was no turning back: the Gears were no longer
solely “Ready to Roll,” they were rolling, and gaining
incredible momentum.
The
39-or-so remaining members proved to be incredibly
dedicated. The design/build team (which became simply
the build team at the end of the painstaking design
process) put in anywhere from one to six hours of work
each day school was in session during the six-week
season, with the other teams putting in considerable
effort and time as well. By season’s end, the graphics
team had produced the team photo gallery along with over
500 buttons, (“These are some big buttons. I like that,”
was one of the more simply-put reactions from other
teams to the well-received buttons) the Public Relations
team had readers of local
newspapers
hooked on the story of team 1713, the business division
provided them with the aforementioned sponsorships, the
travel team left the Gears well-accommodated at the RIT
Inn, the game/drive team had mapped out a strategy sure
to take them to the top, and Owen was prepared to be
shipped.
Of
course, as each team neared accomplishment of its goals
for the season, the K-Island Gears did not begin to
slack off. A very successful spaghetti dinner fundraiser
was one final push to make
sure that the team had the money it needed,
along with the venue for a presentation of Owen, who
made his public debut to great accolades, both for him
and the team, of course.
Finger Lakes
Regional
The 2006
Finger Lakes Regional, the first FIRST competition
attended by the K-Island Gears took place from March
9-11, 2006. Like the other 29 participating teams, the
K-Island Gears came in very hopeful. An exciting and
eventful first day of competition left the Gears in good
shape. It was the next day, however, that mattered: the
selection of play-off alliances was to begin at 11:45.
The team
was not selected for an alliance in the play-offs. The
friendly, good sportsman-like atmosphere led almost all
eliminated teams, including the Gears, to stay and
support the many teams they had met and befriended at
both the hotel and the competition itself.
At the
end of the day, Teams 1126, 229, and 1567 (SparX,
Division by Zero and Shock-a-Botz, respectively) reigned
victorious. Though the game’s winners had been named,
they were not the only winners. The coveted Chairman’s
Award, among others, had yet to have been given. The
Chairman’s Award, completely unrelated to the game’s
final rankings, is given to a team whose sportsmanship
and contribution to the community (among other
qualities) is far beyond even the high expectations of
FIRST. The award, considered FIRST’s most prestigious,
was given to team #340: "Grr!" The team also took home
the Web Design Award, and had some of the more memorable
buttons of the competition. The K-Island Gears had
applied and worked hard for the award, but in the end
the spirited and well-liked team from Churchville, New
York deservedly won.
This
award was not the only award team 1713 was interested
in. Though not the highest-seeding rookie team (ranking
23 out of 30 teams, a very healthy rank for a rookie
team), the Gears were still very much eligible for the
Rookie All-Star Award. Despite the good odds, the team
was still shocked and excited when their name appeared
on the monitor under the heading “Rookie All-Star 2006.”
Aftermath, and
Looking Ahead
The (now
award-winning) team returned to a very proud Thousand
Islands High School on March 13. Though the team was
officially in hiatus until the next year, work did not
cease. As much as possible, planning for the 2006-2007
began, assuring that they would be prepared for the
challenges presented by the following competition.
| Game |
Robot |
Team Leader |
Student Leader |
Number of Members |
Motto |
|
Aim High |
Owen |
Maureen Menton |
Stan |
39 |
"Ready to Roll" |