Happy Pride Month!
Once again, it’s June which means it’s a great time to attend pride festivals, remember our history, and advocate for our future. Here at LGBTQ+ of FIRST, we’re excited to keep building our organization and visibility throughout FIRST programs. It may be the offseason, but we’re keeping busy with administrative streamlining, getting ready for brand new staff members, and gearing up for FIRST seasons to start right back up again. This month, look forward to learning about our past, our present, and our future. Keep an eye out for individual stories, as well as some talk about our community as a whole! Thank you for supporting us and we look forward to a whole month of love, equality, and of course, pride! Love, Your LGBTQ+ of FIRST Staff Ambassador applications are open year round. Representative and Admin applications are open for the month of May 2018!
This year, we’ve made a few changes to our structure. Ambassadors are now only responsible for outreach, such as handing out pins and brochures at competitions. Representatives will take a larger role in content creation and organization, and the position is now open to alumni, volunteers, mentors, and other involved FIRSTers! All of our documentation is in the process of being updated – but we wanted to make sure that you could apply right after Championships! If you have any questions, please contact us. Decisions will be received by the second week of June at the latest. Apply now! Join us on Thursday, April 19 anytime from 11:30 – 12:30 in GRB Convention Center, Room 330B! Meet other members of LGBTQ+ of FIRST and engage in interesting and insightful discussion!
(pictured on far right) Aryn T. | Alumni | Team: 4982 | Pansexual | 2016 – Present Why did you get involved with FIRST? I joined my team in 2014, our rookie year, and have been involved ever since! We went to worlds on Rookie All-Star and I fell in love with the environment and the community and can’t imagine leaving it. Why did you join LGBTQ+ of FIRST? I joined LGBTQ+ of FIRST after noticing a lack of diversity within the community, and where there was diversity, a lack of acceptance. I wanted to create an opening and welcoming environment for any person to be accepted and acknowledged. What are you most looking forward to this competition season? I get to meet countless friends this season, from all over the world. My experiences with the FIRST community have been so positive and I’m so excited to meet the people who have made my time in FIRST so great! Val | Senior | Pansexual | 2017 – Present
What is your favorite experience with LGBTQ+ of FIRST? This might be more of a collection of experiences, but I’ve always loved the late night karaoke sessions we’ve had on the Discord server. Even though people always seem stressed from school or work, we sometimes have these karaoke sessions that just go on for hours with songs from hit musicals, cartoons, and competition. While we sometimes only know each other as a group of names, pictures, and words, karaoke and conversation bring a feeling of togetherness, an organic display of who we are behind carefully curated collection of thoughts we control within our keyboards. It’s a reminder to me that there’s always someone there for support. What are you most looking forward to this competition season? I’ll be doing game announcing training at New York City Regional, but I’m super excited to see how strategy varies between different regions. I haven’t had too much of an opportunity to focus in on regional variants of strategy in the past, so I’m hoping we get to see the game evolve into different branches. What is one cool thing you’ve learned lately? I recently learned how to make origami cranes in my Japanese class, as we’ve been working on a 千羽鶴(Senbazuru) to send to Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. The process of making origami is very soothing, and papercraft in general is very comforting. |
About LGBTQ+ of FIRST
LGBTQ+ of FIRST is a student run organization that advocates awareness and acceptance of LGBTQ+ students, mentors, and volunteers of FIRST Robotics. LGBTQ+ of FIRST reaches out to over 1000 members across the FIRST regions and fronts multiple outreach endeavors. Archives
November 2022
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