Our Story • Our Journey

You will see FTC mentioned in multiple parts of this website. So you might be asking yourself what is FTC? Well, it stands for First Tech Challenge, and this is a part of a organization called For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology or FIRST for short that helps kids in school learn more technical and difficult things. Building, Coding, and Designing are big building blocks. They have a Lego League for young students at different levels, FTC for medium size robotics and coding, and FRC for high school students to build gigantic complicated robots in a large arena. If you want a full detailed description them up here.

We started out very differently from most teams in many ways. For instance, we've been learning FTC robotics for years on our own time and our own way—observing competitions and modifying them for ourselves. We steadily improved over the years, but in 2024 during our mini competition (where two teams tied after hours of rounds), we knew it was time to compete at the state level. This led to the 2024-2025 Into the Deep season, our first competitive year. We weren't expecting to perform well in our first year, but we were pleasantly surprised to find ourselves in the running. This brings us to our FTC history.

During the Into the Deep season—our rookie year—we were surprised to find that we could hold our own in a match. We started behind the curb, meaning we could have been closer to the front from the beginning. After missing the first two League Meets (resulting in a 0-10 record), we attended the third meet and, despite several malfunctions, managed a 1-4 record. This left us at 1-14 going into the qualifiers. At Reddington High School, where the first state qualifier was held, we posted a 4-1 win-loss ratio—a strong performance considering our previous record. However, with an overall record of 5-15, we were among the bottom teams. At the next qualifier, starting fresh, we ended the day with a 3-2 record, even though our robot encountered issues beyond our control. We almost made the playoffs but ultimately fell short, so we resorted to attending the Fairbanks qualifier. Despite challenges en route and competing virtually, we set a state record by winning with a 6-1 record (including two playoff wins), which qualified us for the State Championship. There, despite performing well, poor luck with partners resulted in a 2-3 record and a 16th place ranking. However, our performance caught the eye of the third seed, who selected us for their alliance, ultimately elevating our state ranking to around 6th.

In the future, we plan to do things differently and perform even better. We are currently exploring multiple strategies for preparation, design, and overall approach for next year. We also have plans to start tutoring a sister team—if that happens, we'll include a link here. Overall, this year has given us a clearer vision of our direction, and we are excited about our prospects. We hope to attend the World Championship in Houston next year, confident in our ability to compete at that level. With new recruitment efforts underway and a refreshed approach to our portfolio, we look forward to an even more successful year ahead. See you next year!