We are excited to begin our fourth FTC season. The FIRST theme for 2023-2024 is FIRST in SHOW. The FIRST Tech Challenge season is called #CENTERSTAGE. You can keep up with us on our FTC Center Stage season page. We’ll update this page with the 2023-2024 game details in September after kickoff.

2020-2021 was our “FTC Rookie Season”. You can review it on our FTC Ultimate Goal season page.

2021-2022 was our second season, in which we were able to attend the FTC World Championship. You can read about our FTC Freight Frenzy season here.

What is FIRST Tech Challenge?

“It’s way more than building robots. FIRST Tech Challenge teams (up to 15 team members, grades 7-12) are challenged to design, build, program, and operate robots to compete in a head-to-head challenge in an alliance format.

Guided by adult coaches and mentors, students develop STEM skills and practice engineering principles, while realizing the value of hard work, innovation, and working as a team.”

FIRST Tech Challenge, is a move up from LEGOs to 18″ aluminum and steel robots. Each season begins in September when the new challenge is released. Depending on region, scrimmages, qualifiers, and state tournaments begin as early as November leading up to the FIRST Tech Challenge World Championship in April.

The components of an FTC competition are:

• Robot Games – 5-6 qualification rounds played in randomized alliance format, followed by alliance selection and elimination rounds — Games are 2.5 minutes long, the first 30 seconds are autonomous and the remainder is remote controlled. The game field is 12′ x 12′ on foam tiles with a 1′ high perimeter.
• Engineering Portfolio (required) – 15 pages max – summary of your season and team, see Game Manual 1 for specifics
• Engineering Notebook (optional) – all documentation about your season, engineering design process, programming, outreach, team business and more
• Judges Interview – Presentation and Q&A time with the judges about your robot and season

Official FTC Resources:

• FIRST Tech Challenge – Game & Season Page
• CENTERSTAGE Game Resources (currently still Power Play, but it will update in September)
• FIRST Tech Challenge – Programming Resources
• FIRST Tech Challenge – Robot Building Resources
• FIRST Tech Challenge Judges Q&A Forum
• FIRST Tech Challenge Forum
• FIRST Tech Challenge YouTube Channel

Unofficial FTC Resources:

• Game Manual 0 (Zero) – unofficial manual maintained by past and current teams
• r/FTC Subreddit
• FTC Discord Server
• FIRST Updates Now (FUN) Twitch Channel

Here is the 2022-2023 Season Challenge Video. The specifics about last season’s challenge start at about the 1 minute mark. If you have questions about FIRST robotics, FIRST LEGO League or FIRST Tech Challenge, please let us know. We would love to help you get started.