About
Cougar Robotics Team1403, is a FIRST Robotics Competition team from Montgomery High School, in
Skillman, New Jersey. The Robotics team was first started at Montgomery High School in 2004, since
then, it has expanded to the point where we have become a New Jersey host of the Kickoff Event, as
well as the host of the after-season event: Monty Madness. Team 1403 Cougar Robotics has grown in
membership since that time, with over fifty students on the team. In addition, we are now
sponsored by over four different groups, including Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS), and Convatec.
What is FIRST?
FIRST, or For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology, is an organization founded by inventor Dean Kamen in 1989 in order to develop ways to inspire students in engineering and technology fields. The organization is the foundation for the FIRST Robotics Competition, the FIRST LEG O League, and the FIRST Tech Challenge competition. FIRST seeks to promote a philosophy of teamwork and collaboration among engineers and encourages competing teams to remain friendly, helping each other out when necessary. The term frequently applied to this ethos is "gracious professionalism," a term coined by Woodie Flowers which supports respect towards one's competitors and integrity in one's actions.
What is The FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC)?
The first program developed through FIRST was the FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC), which is designed to inspire high school students to become engineers by giving them real world experience working with professional engineers to develop a robot. The inaugural FIRST Robotics Competition was held in 1992 in the Manchester Memorial High School gymnasium.[5] As of 2007, over 1300 high school teams totaling over 32,306 students from Brazil, Canada, Israel, Mexico, the Netherlands, the United States, the United Kingdom[2], and more compete in the annual competition. The competition challenge changes each year, and the teams cannot reuse components created for previous robots. The robots weigh around 120 pounds (depending on the current year's rules). The kit issued to each team contains a base set of parts. Details of the game are released at the beginning of January, and the teams are given six weeks to construct a competitive robot that can accomplish the game's tasks. In 2007, teams competed in 37[6] regional competitions throughout March in an effort to qualify for the FIRST Championship in Atlanta, Georgia in April. Previous years' Championships have been held in Houston, Texas and at Walt Disney World's Epcot.[7] In 2008 there will be 41 regional competitions. (Source: Wikipedia)