Community Outreach

Community Outreach: What We Do
As a team, we work together to spread the word about our programs to inspire and involve others. These past years, we participate in demos, hosting competitions, and supporting FIRST throughout its growth.

Hosting Competitions:
In 2012, when MAR was founded, we were the first to start hosting district competitions outside of Michigan. We host our FRC qualifying event for FMA during competition week 1. We also host an offseason competition, HAVOC, to help team members gain experience, try new things and to have fun. This year, HAVOC was organized and run by the students of Team 708 with the help of our mentors. In 2013, we started hosting a FLL qualifier event, which we later rebranded to Hattricks, when we added FTC and FLL Jr. In 2016. We did this to show the range of FIRST programs we offer and inspire students to continue progressing with FIRST.

Demos:
Aside from hosting competitions, we participate in demos. In 2018, we partnered with Simon Malls and presented our robot at King of Prussia, where people a variety of people from different backgrounds can see what FIRST is about. In 2018, we were invited to attend the Rockwell Automation Fair where we assisted in showing FIRST to innovators from all over the world. Over the summer and offseason, we enjoy showing our robot to our local community. We show our robot and the programs our district offers at events like the Hatboro Car Show and Horsham Night Out. Not only do we show off our FRC bot, we also show aspects of all our programs. In 2019, we added an FLL Jr. diorama and created our own mini FLL board. On the FLL board, kids could run programs and watch them complete missions, much like what FLL is like. We would explain what Hatboro-Horsham offers and give more information on FIRST programs.

Expanding FIRST:
Team 708 was founded in 2001 with the help of Motorola engineers. In 2011 we brought three FLL teams to our middle school which later expanded to six at the middle school and five more throughout our elementary schools. In 2016, we brought both the FTC and FLL Jr. Programs to our district. With these additions, students can experience FIRST from grades 2-12, with the skills in each program building on to help students be successful in their future endeavors with FIRST and in the real world. Also, high school students are encouraged to mentor FLL students at Keith Valley Middle School, where they pass on their experience and knowledge to younger students and learn valuable leadership skills.

Fundraising and Monetary Support:
We have great support for our programs from our district and sponsors. Our district created a robotics department that is overseen by our head mentor, which supports not only the high school team, but all other FIRST teams in our district. In addition to our district, we are also generously sponsored by Vulcan Spring, Lockheed Martin, the Landreth Family, and Rockwell Automation. While we have great support from our sponsors, we also have our own fundraisers. Our offseason event, HAVOC, allows us to fundraise for our upcoming season while having fun with teams in our area.

Helping Other Teams:
Our team is committed to helping other teams. Throughout the build season, we maintain an open shop policy. At our week 1 competition, we have a staffed machine shop that is open for all teams; any materials or parts that are in our shop are available for teams to use. Prior to the 2018 season, our mentors worked with Centennial school district to help them start an FRC team, 6808. During the season, members from our team help share knowledge and skills with the founding members of their team. On weeks that we are not competing, members and mentors volunteer at other competitions across FMA