News

Recruiting more than trustees

We're on the hunt for some simply brilliant people to share their talent, expertise and time to take the UK’s most exciting tech-education charity to the next level. You will be pivotal in shaping and enacting our new 3-yea...

Stories

Stay up with date with all the latest news, knowledge and robot madness from HQ.

Southeast Regional 2 2021-22 results

Our final teams of the season were summoned at the RAF London Museum to battle the season's FIRST Tech Challenge game, FREIGHT FRENZY. 20 teams stepped up to the game field in fear...

Posted 14 July 2022

West Midlands Regional 2021-22 results

Teams united for the first time in two years to tackle the latest FIRST Tech Challenge game, FREIGHT FRENZY. Joining forces at the Southeast Regional 1 tournament, 24 teams lit up ...

Posted 14 July 2022

Northern Ireland Regional 2021-22 results

The friendliest teams in the region joined forces at the iconic W5 science discovery centre to challenge the FIRST Tech Challenge game, FREIGHT FRENZY at the Northern Ireland Regio...

Posted 14 July 2022

North West Regional 2021-22 results

Teams gathered for what may be the smallest mighty regional event in UK history at the Wade Deacon High School with a quintessentially British flair during the Queen's Jubilee cele...

Posted 29 June 2022

Southeast Regional 1 2021-22 results are in!

Teams united for the first time in two years to tackle the latest FIRST Tech Challenge game, FREIGHT FRENZY. Joining forces at the Southeast Regional 1 tournament, 24 teams lit up ...

Posted 27 May 2022

Concluding a phenomenal season – national awards and beyond!

What a year it has been! Teams, we’re immensely proud of every single one of you for your commitment and dedication during the most tumultuous season ever experienced. Teachers a...

Posted 20 July 2021

Think Award Winner — Team F.R.I.T.E.S.

About the team We have a very close-knit, motivated and involved team, with different but complementary profiles in programming, construction, design and communication. A good atm...

Posted 19 July 2021

Inspire Award Winner — Team GroundX

About the team Hi, we are GroundX. We are a group of 6th form students who are studying at Outwood Academy Newbold in Chesterfield. We started with the FIRST Tech Challenge UK ...

Posted 19 July 2021

Motivate Award Winner — Team Binary Bots

About our team Hi! We’re Binary Bots 003 from London. We’ve been a FIRST Tech Challenge team in the UK for three years now, and we are passionate about robotics. Our team memb...

Posted 19 July 2021

Collins Aerospace Innovate award winner — Team CalderDrones

About our team We’re a 10-person-strong team from Liverpool, UK, and we have a passion for robotics. We’ve put in hundreds of hours of work on our robot this year – every te...

Posted 19 July 2021

Connect Award Winner — Team Snapwire

About the team Team Snapwire is a group of 8 pupils in Year 8 at Perton Middle School. Our team is successful because we thrive on teamwork and we support each other in any way po...

Posted 19 July 2021

UK Remote Event 2: Scores and awards!

After excellent performances from teams hitting the Ultimate game field last month, more teams across the country jumped to challenge the Ultimate Goal game in round two of our rem...

Posted 6 July 2021

UK Remote Event 1: The results are in!

The first set of UK teams hit the Ultimate Goal game field last week, marking the first week of our UK remote competition season. Fired and ready to perform, 12 teams battled the 2...

Posted 11 June 2021

Educational consultant opportunity

We are seeking an experienced Computer Science educator to act as an educational consultant and drive forward our development of a robotics coding simulator. Our partner Bloomberg ...

Posted 11 March 2021

Helping you navigate the season ahead

Hey teams and Team Leads, this season kicked off with a rocky start and we appreciate you all for hanging in there! The government announced on 22 February that schools and college...

Posted 2 March 2021

Watch The Download 2020-21 Kick-off edition

FIRST Tech Challenge UK is kicking off this season from 11-29 Jan 2021 with three flexible weeks for teams to share, connect and inspire each other as they get to grips with the Ul...

Posted 2 February 2021

Dom’s strategy tips

We asked a Dom, previous Strategy Officer from the Binary Bots team in London, what tips and tricks they would pass along to help other teams when planning their season. They had l...

Posted 20 January 2021

Let’s get kick-off readyyy!

Teams, it’s time to launch! Suit up with the tools you need to jumpstart the season during Kick-off Month, Monday 11 - Friday 29 January 2021. While many of you are remote lea...

Posted 17 December 2020

Impress the judges with these five engineering notebook principles

Forget about robots for a second, the engineering notebook is hands down the most important material any team will produce in FIRST Tech Challenge UK. No team can be assessed for a...

Posted 2 December 2020

Ideas to organise your team around Covid-19 safety measures

Hey teams and Team Leads, how’s it going? 👋 We’re seeing plenty of teams get creative with building a team and running sessions while protective measures are in place. Hereâ...

Posted 14 October 2020

Bring on 2020-21 – new provision, new tech, new opportunities!

We have news! No, there are no FIRST baby bots on the horizon, although technically… kind of? More on that later... Registration for next season is NOW OPEN! That’s right, head...

Posted 1 September 2020

Next season’s tech just got better

Let’s face it, we’re entering the 2020-21 season in a very different world, and recognise this presents new challenges for teams to connect and collaborate. This season, we’r...

Posted 1 September 2020

Cross-party support for #FurloughForGood

Baroness Tyler and 14 cross-party members of the House of Lords have supported the #furloughforgood campaign by writing directly to the Chancellor of the Exchequer seeking urgent c...

Posted 11 May 2020

Charities Minister urged to rethink furlough

Baroness Barran, Minister for Civil Society yesterday responded to questions from peers surrounding support for charities and allowing fuloughed charity employees to volunteer for ...

Posted 1 May 2020

Surveying the impact of furlough and Covid-19 on charities

Whilst the Chancellor’s injection of £750 million for the sector is welcome, this funding will largely be accessible only to organisations involved in the covid-19 response and ...

Posted 9 April 2020

Furlough for good – an open letter to the Chancellor of the Exchequer

UK Charities risk grinding to a halt just as they are needed most. COVID-19 is affecting all aspects of our lives and society in ways we are only just beginning to contemplate. Mea...

Posted 28 March 2020

Coronavirus – statement from CEO

The arrival of coronavirus (Covid-19) on UK shores could not have happened at a more challenging time for the charity and the young people we serve. The inaugural UK Championship s...

Posted 6 March 2020

FAQ: Championship cancellation

Not sure what to do next about the champs? No problem. Find details regarding changes to the national championship, the new virtual tournament and how to recover costs on this FAQ ...

Posted 6 March 2020

Elated teams progress at South East mega regional

Largest regional competition drives inclusion among teenagers in an area with great socio-economic divide, powered by Arm and Qualcomm Incorporated 10 February 2020: Robots buil...

Posted 8 February 2020

West Midlands double whammy soars 35 teams to the Olympic Park

Automotive and aerospace engineering heartland hosted competition powered by Collins Aerospace and its mega squad of industry volunteers, geared to make STEM less intimidating and ...

Posted 6 February 2020

Northern Ireland feat advances top teams to London

Prime for innovation growth following its Aerospace engineering roots, Northern Ireland hosted competition to develop local STEM talent. Robots built by students in Northern Ire...

Posted 6 February 2020

North West alliance wins by one point in nail-biting finish!

Wade Deacon High School, Cheadle Hulme High School and The Observatory School are crowned North West's Winning Alliance after a knife-edged final robotics match, winning by 39 poin...

Posted 3 February 2020

South West competitors set sights on champs after regional triumph

The competition run by FIRST® Tech Challenge UK aims to ignite aspirations in young people and connect Bristol’s tech and engineering workforce with emerging talent Robots bu...

Posted 29 January 2020

Looking back on 2019

It's been a phenomenal three months of robotics action since we kicked-off with SKYSTONE, this season's challenge. Teams have been phenomenal, with some ups, downs, and mini triump...

Posted 20 December 2019

Building a strong game strategy – a lesson from team Binary Bots

Having a game strategy is critical when competing in the FIRST Tech Challenge. Not only does it help teams to focus on how they’ll score points, it also guides the robot’s desi...

Posted 25 October 2019

Makerspace launches in Alpha

We’re excited to share the launch of our digital educational platform ‘Makerspace’ in Alpha. After a solid six months of development and consultation with industry, educators...

Posted 4 October 2019

FIRST Tech Challenge UK 2019-20 kicks off at Bloomberg’s European HQ

Last year was the pilot, this year we're going big! Kicking off at Bloomberg's European HQ, the world's largest robotics competition has officially launched nationwide to make S...

Posted 25 September 2019

We’re hiring! Director of Development – critical mission, epic culture, so-so salary…

We’re looking for a dynamic and tenacious team player and leader who is mission-oriented, focused on impact and getting us there better, faster. Someone who shares our vision of ...

Posted 14 August 2019

‘I don’t like robots but that’s why I loved interning at FIRST UK’ confesses Jacob

Jacob, aged 17 from Haberdashers’ Aske’s Boys’ School, Elstree, jumped at the chance to intern with us this summer, despite his detest for robots (we don’t judge here at FI...

Posted 29 July 2019

‘We truly do things that matter’ – Jasmine reflects on her FIRST internship

Jasmine, 16, from the American School in London, shares her hands-on interning experience at FIRST UK headquarters this summer. Jasmine is no FIRST noob, she spent three years in F...

Posted 17 July 2019

Beat the FIRST robot maze blindfolded

We're on a road trip exhibiting at local Big Bang Fairs near you. Think your school could drive a robot blindfolded? We're challenging young people in pairs to drive a mini-bot ...

Posted 28 June 2019

Building the technologists of the future

'Passion for progress’, ‘we, not I’, and ‘be your brilliant self’ As Community & Inclusion Specialist at Arm, Anna Malan drives engagement of the technology giant'...

Posted 24 May 2019

Pioneers represent UK at FIRST world robotics championships!

UK Inspire Award winners from Newcastle Academy (Newbotics101) and St. Christopher School (St Chris Snowflakes) broke UK boundaries at the world’s largest robotics competition th...

Posted 17 May 2019

2019 game theme announced – registration open!

FIRST has offically announced what we’ve all been waiting for! The global theme for the 2019-20 season is drumroll… FIRST RISE powered by Star Wars: Force for Change But ...

Posted 3 May 2019

A royal FIRST! – CEO meets Her Majesty the Queen

…and Rover holds a street party to celebrate. It’s been an exciting year for the team at FIRST® UK – a full-on rollercoaster ride working hard to lift this programme off ...

Posted 1 May 2019

Robotics team share their ‘whirlwind of a journey’ ahead of global championship

Written by Hugo Cracknell, from St Chris Snowflakes, team 002. Right now, I’m sat with the team trying to find words to sum up this whole crazy experience; however, we are sti...

Posted 18 March 2019

Elated Newcastle Academy team prevail at northern championships

Robot-savvy staffordshire students secure once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to represent the UK at global robotics tournament in the USA Almost 600 students from across the North W...

Posted 18 March 2019

Judges ‘tickled pink’ by Inspire Award winners

Robot-savvy Cambridgeshire students secure once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to represent the UK at global robotics tournament in the USA Almost 500 students from across the South ...

Posted 14 March 2019

Tomorrow’s innovators get robot ready

Students from schools across Greater Manchester, Stoke-on-Trent and the wider Staffordshire area are gearing up to compete in the inaugural FIRST® Tech Challenge UK Championship...

Posted 11 March 2019
  • We build More Than Robots

    We use robots, role models and competitions to make STEM less intimidating, more diverse and inclusive, empowering young people to make informed choices about their future.