Team Leaders, here are the final notes on the event. Travel safely.
General Food considerations
The Great Northern competition is held in the Alerus Center which has vendor contracts that prohibit the public from bringing their own food and drinks into an event. This applies to all teams and spectators. Please don’t try to “sneak in” food or drinks. To enforce this rule, robot inspectors will be monitoring load in. Every student will receive a water bottle courtesy of the Grand Forks Visitor’s Bureau (that will be 1200 identical bottles so bring something to identify yours) and beverage coolers will be placed around the venue for refilling bottles. Concessions will be open. Please review event rules with your team members:
https://firstfrc.blob.core.win
Note that this document does not specifically say ‘food’ because the rules apply also to district events.
Team Seminars
These seminars are hosted by teams and, as you can see, cover a variety of topics. They are usually quite informative. The location is Ballroom 4.
12:00pm – 12:45pm Event Ambassador training
This is for students who sign up to be event tour guides
1:00pm – 1:45pm Core Values (Team 2177 plus others)
This presentation will discuss core values, describe a student-driven process for developing your own team’s set, and provide a perspective from several team that have done this exercise.
2:00pm – 2:45pm Diversity and Inclusion (Team 2500)
Discuss ways for team to attract more students and understand the issues that may be preventing students from joining your team.
3:00pm – 3:45pm Mentor Roundtable and MN Robotics Coaches Assoc.
This is an informal session covering a variety of topics that are important to team mentors.
4:00pm – 4:45pm Dead Battery Project (Team 3313)
All women (students and mentors) are invited to have a conversation about the Dead Battery Project which focuses on sexual harassment.
5:00pm – 5:45pm Chairman’s Exchange (Team 2169)
Teams are encouraged to share their Chairman’s presentations and discuss their essays.
Load in
Load-in hours are Wednesday night 6:00pm to 9:00pm and Thursday 7:45am to 8:30am. It looks very possible that there will be snow or rain during load-in. Please take appropriate measures to protect your robot and equipment from the weather. If you have weather-related issues that affect loading in at those times, please contact Russ (218-689-9732) or Mary (218-689-9733) Anderson, the GNR Planning Committee Co-chairs. Directions can be found here:
https://mnfirst.org/the-great-
A driver must stay with the vehicle at all times – no excuses. This is a courtesy to other teams. When curbside drop-off is complete, the vehicle must be moved. Only 5 people (one must be an adult) will be allowed in the pit for setup. For safety purposes, robots will be directed to a holding area so that they are not in the pits during pit setup. Once a team’s pit setup is complete, the robot can be retrieved from the holding area and returned to the team’s designated pit. Teams are not allowed to work on their robots until 8:30am Thursday morning. The pits close promptly at 9:00pm on Wednesday night. Teams loading-in on Thursday morning will follow the same procedure beginning at 7:45am. When a team’s pit setup is complete, the setup crew must leave the pit area and not return until 8:30am on Thursday morning. Please tell your students and appropriate mentors about this procedure.
Regards, Mark Lawrence
Chairman, MN FIRST Regional Planning Committee