Please join us in welcoming three new members to the FIRST in Upper Midwest board – Doug Frisk, Bryan Herbst, and Jon Stratis.
Doug Frisk has been involved in FIRST Robotics as a parent and volunteer since 2012. He is a founding organizer of, and the communications lead of the Arrowhead Robotics Coalition (ARC), the Competitive Robotics Hub in northeastern Minnesota. He is a past mentor for Team 2512, the Duluth East Daredevils and was instrumental in starting Team 6819 Viking Robotics, the first FRC team in Sweden. Doug is a FIRST Robotics Competition event volunteer covering several roles since 2014, in recent years he has served as scorekeeper at events in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, North Dakota, Michigan, Texas, and California. Doug is a self-employed IT consultant and trainer specializing in Microsoft server and Microsoft 365 technologies.
Bryan Herbst has been involved with Team 2052, KnightKrawler (from New Brighton, MN) since 2007 as both a student and mentor. He has volunteered in many different volunteer roles since 2011, most recently as a FIRST Technical Advisor at Minnesota regionals and the FIRST Robotics Competition Championship. While studying at the University of Minnesota: Twin Cities, he served as President of the FRC alumni organization. Bryan is a Lead Engineer at Target working on Target’s Android applications.
Jon Stratis is a founding mentor to Team 2177, The Robettes in Mendota Heights. He has volunteered since 2011, first as a Robot Inspector, then Lead Robot Inspector, and serves as a division Lead Robot Inspector at the FIRST Robotics Competition Championship. After joining the Minnesota Regional Planning committee, he oversaw a redesign of the regional website and its conversion to the FUM website, and manages the state rankings for the annual Minnesota State High School League-FIRST Robotics Championship. Jon is a Senior Software Engineer at Trimin Systems, in the Government Solutions division.
Board members are nominated by FUM’s Nominating and Governance Committee, which consists of Woodie Flowers Finalist Award winners who mentor Minnesota teams. They were appointed at the July 19 Board meeting. Bryan and Jon were appointed to partial terms ending June 30, 2021, and Doug was appointed to a full-term ending June 30, 2022.
At that same meeting, Rachel Clark and Ryan Swanson left the board. The entire board expresses our thanks for both Rachel and Ryan’s contribution to our early success, and we look forward to seeing their future contributions to the success of FIRST and STEM education generally.