There are many things that are important when a FIRST team decides to submit for awards.
Make sure at least one student has an account on STIMS (https://my.usfirst.org/stims/site.lasso) Be sure that they have also been accepted as a team member. Each year you are required to re-apply to be a team member. Your team advisor must also give them the authorization to be an “Awards Submitter”. Once your team advisor has selected this student as an awards submitter the student should see a box called “Awards Submissions” at the bottom once they log in.
All of the award deadlines can be found here: http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprograms/frc/content.aspx?id=454 Make sure you keep a schedule while you are preparing your documents for award submissions. It is extremely stressful when you are editing an essay at 2:00 in the morning because it is due the next day at noon.
You can find the FIRST award criteria documents on our website underneath Rescources>Helpful Tips and Documents, which is also the last page of this “book” or on the official FIRST website at http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprograms/frc/content.aspx?id=440. Be sure that your submissions follow these criteria before you submit or you will not be eligible.
Below you can find our winning Chairman’s Awards submissions, what was announced when we won awards, and documentation of the 2008 Chairman’s Award winner, Team 842, conference call.