FINAL process for Provincial Grant Application

Hello coaches (past, present, and future)!

FLL's team registration system will be open for business on May 2nd for the 2011 Food Factor Season.  FIRST Robotics Canada has received a grant from the provincial government to support the growth of FIRST programs within Ontario.  We are pleased to announce that we will be partially funding 40 new teams in Ontario this year!

NOTE: If you get the grant of $750 you must still purchase a Field Setup Kit for $78 (unless you already have access to one for the 2011 Food Factor season) and build a table (instructions can be found here - while the table is not mandatory, it is strongly recommended).  Lastly, you will want your team to attend a tournament in the fall (November or December) and while tournament costs vary, you should plan to spend $150 per team for tournament registration.  In total, after the grant, you will need around $250 for your team.  The $750 grant is to cover the majority of the costs of starting up a team, which include the robot and the team registration fee (different than the tournament registration fee). Please see this page for information on description and pricing associated with materials for an FLL team.

In previous years without the funding, teams usually participated in fundraising activities such as bake sales, car washes, and sponsorship from local businesses.  Many local shops will gladly give $50-100 to a team if they'll add their company's name to the back of a team shirt.  These can be great learning opportunities for students as well (in marketing, promotion, communication, business concepts, and partnerships). 

If you are not selected as one of the 40 teams to receive the grant this spring you will be placed on a waiting list for the grant for the fall reimbursement.  While I cannot guarantee you will receive funding, there is a good chance the money will eventually be reimbursed; however, you should be prepared to accept the possibility that it will not.
 
The process is explained fully in the documentation listed at the bottom of this post (which will also be posted on our website in the next few days); however, in a nutshell, you must:

1. FIRST register (by going to https://gofll.usfirst.org/) AND PAY for your team within FLL's Team Registration System (which opens on May 2nd, at noon)
2. THEN submit your form for the grant (see paperwork attached) to the following email address: FIRST@ylf-fyl.ca (the Yves Landry Foundation has graciously agreed to handle the administrative process of the grant) - do NOT email the application to fllontario@gmail.com.
   
3. NOTE: only fully completed grant applications which have official FLL Team #'s (given to you upon registering with FLL) and school boards listed will be accepted as received and placed in the queue for funding!!!
   
4. if your submission is complete you will receive an email confirming receipt of your application.
5. once your application has been approved you will be notified of the good news and mailed a cheque for $750 to reimburse you for the cost of the robot and registration to start up a new team OR a cheque for $250 to cover the cost of your registration if you are a veteran team applying for the mentoring grant.
6. If you send in your grant application but miss out on this opportunity because all of the funds are absorbed by other teams, you will be added to a waiting list and may be contacted if more funds become available. 
   
7. In any case, your supplies (robot and Field Setup Kit [FSK]) will be delivered in late August and the game will be released on September 2nd!  Become a follower of my blog to keep up to date on all things FLL in Ontario.
   

Please read through the documents THOROUGHLY so you understand the process completely.  If you have questions after reading the documents, please feel free to email FIRST@ylf-fyl.ca.

New Team Application (latest version of Word)
New Team Application (old version of Word)

Mentor Application (latest version of Word)
Mentor Application (old version of Word)

Please note, if your school board has a centrally assigned Science or robotics individual, please contact them prior to registering to see if they have coordinated anything board-wide in which you might already be included.

Thank you once again for your interest in our FIRST programs and specifically in FLL.

Have a great season!

Dave

Dave Ellis
FLL Operational Partner - Ontario, Canada
www.firstroboticscanada.org

Presenting ASIMO at the OSC!

Hello teams!

I hope you are enjoying the spring weather (sort of) and dreaming of warmer days when FLL registration opens again - at noon on May 2nd - a not-so-subtle plug... :) More news on the provincial grant opportunities in an email tomorrow...

For today, I have BIG news! The Ontario Science Centre and Honda have teamed up to make a presentation of the Honda robot ASIMO available to the kids of Ontario. In a nutshell, $6 gets each of your kids in the door of the OSC and in to see one of 3 presentations of ASIMO starting around 10 a.m on May 13th. You're welcome to come earlier and see the other OSC exhibits if you desire. You're welcome to stay the day afterward as well. They are offering this as a pre-release to the general public (which will go out to schools next week). If you are interested in taking advantage of this with your team, please contact Todd Fowler of Honda at todd_fowler@ch.honda.com and book your seats before they're all gone!

More details in this document. All questions should be directed to Todd please.

Thanks,

Dave

Congratulations to our Globe-Trotting teams of Ontario!

I just wanted to announce that a few of our Ontario teams have been selected to represent Ontario at some of the global FLL competitions taking place in the next couple of months. We submitted an application to the World Festival (WF) for our 1st Place Core Values team, the TechnoSurgeons from Tomken Road PS which was accepted!! Congratulations TechnoSurgeons and good luck!

In addition to our two WF teams (the Sentinels [provincial champs] and the TechnoSurgeons) we also have two teams attending the US Open in California! These two teams were selected via a draw from our 1st Place Award winners from the provincial championships and will be heading down to the US Open in May. Congratulations goes out to the SCS Penguins from St. Clement's School and the Road Runners from Glen Ames PS!

Good luck to all four of our globe-trotting teams as they represent Ontario on the world stage!

Congratulations!!

Congratulations goes out to The Sentinels, from Oakville, who won our provincial championship tournament and have qualified for World Festival in St. Louis at the end of April. In addition to this accomplishment, they were featured on the Canadian Diabetes Association website through an article about their research project on diabetes. You can see the article here and watch their video on YouTube here.

Great job Sentinels!!

Good luck in St. Louis!

Dave

Grant application

Hello teams,

For those of you interested in the spring grant, please remember that you and/or the team you're mentoring must purchase a registration from FLL first and THEN apply for the grant. Interest in this program is growing so I would suggest that you register early in May (when registration opens) and apply immediately for the grant. More information on this process will be posted in the next few weeks so check back often!

Dave

Provincial Championships

Hello everyone,

So it's been a while since I posted something new on the blog but I wanted to draw your attention to a couple things. First of all, the Provincial Championships were a huge success once again as we had 50 teams competing against each other with lots of hardware being handed out. A big thank you to UOIT for being our host and donating most of the university to our event! In addition, we had sponsorship from OPG once again this year and RIM came on board as a major sponsor of our program as well.

A big congratulations goes out to all the teams who competed on January 15th at UOIT. If you're interested in checking out the results of our event, you can see it on our new site. Other media coverage of the event includes:
http://www.newsdurhamregion.com/article/169634
http://www.uoit.ca/EN/main2/about/news_events/news_archives/news_releases/2011/20110118_1.html
http://www.diabetes.ca/get-involved/news/kids-share-their-winning-idea-for-diabetes-management/
http://planetyou.discoverychannel.ca/mediadetail/3565301

And if you're interested in seeing some photos of the event, please check out Ian Goodall's photos from the day at: http://ian.photoshelter.com/gallery/G0000HBX2o1WW750

Take care everyone!

Dave

15 minutes of fame!!

OK, so not 15 minutes...but 5 minutes is good too!

Planning is in full swing for the Provincial Championships and this year we would like to try something new. Because the Pilot that Ontario is in (don't forget to provide feedback on the pilot!) has placed more of an even emphasis on Teamwork, Project, and Design we would like that reflected in what people see as well. Much of what is great in FLL is done behind doors in the judges rooms.

Do you have a great presentation that you would love others to see? Wouldn't it be great if it could be show-cased at the Provincial Championships?! Your team didn't qualify for the Provincial Championships? No problem - anyone can send their presentation to us! Check out the details below.

Details:
What: We'd like to show your presentation in video. There are no strings attached and nothing implied, just a chance to show your work to the crowd.
When: submission deadline is Friday, December 17th so DON'T DELAY!
Where: The selected presentations will be shown at the Provincial Championships at UOIT on January 15th!
Why: Because it's FUN! Also, it will be a chance for people to see some entertaining presentations that they would normally never see!
How: send us your presentation in a common video format (mov, wmv, etc.) on CD/DVD or via the internet (Youtube or some other creative way of getting it to us) and we will choose a few to show at the Provincial Champioships. You can email the video to fllontario@gmail.com or you can snailmail it to us at:

FIRST Robotics Canada

P.O. Box 518, Pickering Main

Pickering, Ontario

L1V 2R7

Have fun!

Dave Ellis
FLL Operational Partner - Ontario, Canada
http://fllontario.org/