NORWICH—On Nov. 11, 2015 in Malta, NY the Chenango County FIRST Team #145 was awarded a $5,000 New York Tech Valley FIRST Sponsors’ grant award.

FIRST Programs offer students a one of a kind opportunity to design and build robots alongside mentors from their communities.

Likewise, these engineers-in-training take their creations to compete in tournaments where teams receive recognition for design excellence, sportsmanship, teamwork, and where their creativity in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) skills are celebrated.

Programs such as FIRST Robotics showcase a true investment in the education of students, teaching them how to become producers of new technology—not just consumers.

“The pressure of building an effective robot that you are proud of in just six weeks and the camaraderie that’s established with your teammates and mentors is an indescribable feeling you won’t get anywhere else,” said Vinny Loscavio, a senior from Norwich.

Conor Ryan, a freshman at Sherburne–Earlville high school said that he joined FIRST because “building robots is fun; and it will help get me into college.”