Designing and building a FIRST robot can be a daunting undertaking, especially for rookie teams or new members of existing teams.  Ideally, every member of the team should have enough background to make a contribution during the 6-week build season starting January 3rd.  Without seeing a wide range of robots, and understanding some technical basics, it’s hard to take a central role.  That’s where FIRSTFare comes in.

FIRSTFare is both a robot show and a collection of technical/marketing seminars. You’ll get a detailed look at a wide collection of last year’s robots from veteran teams.  You can ask dumb questions and no one will laugh nor will they feel like you’re “spying”.  The teams coming to this event are there to share the tribal knowledge they’ve gathered

The other main function of FIRSTFare will be seminars on a variety of topics.  These are typically presentations by experienced students, mentors, or vendors.  There are multiple seminar tracks with something of interest to anyone on a FIRST team. If you are a member or mentor of a FIRST Robotics Competition team this is the place to be.

SCHEDULE
FIRSTFare was held held November 1st, 2008. Robots and teams started arriving at 10:00am. The seminars start at 11:00am and continue through 4:30pm. The schedule can be found here.

DOWNLOADS
Files, PowerPoints, and other content from the FIRSTFare presentations can be found here.