This season, we built three robots, put in hundreds of hours designing, building, on outreach and fundraising, and proved our way into the semi-finals to compete against the cream of the crop at the FTC Championship in St. Louis last weekend. And we held our own, helping our Edison alliance stay in the game for three full matches, with towering crate lifts every time!

In the end, the Winning Alliance honor went to Kentucky’s Team 4444, Whitefield Academy Robotics Alliance, which included our Tampa Bay neighbors Middleton Robotics team Masquerade (way to go Masquerade!) and Team 354, Coyote Robotics of Virginia, and we took a top ten finish. Fellow Floridians Team 5454, dent in the universe, earned the Rockwell Collins Innovate Award. So it was a great showing for the Sunshine State!

We’re so very grateful to all our friends, supporters, donors and mentors. Special thanks to Mr. Paul Markun of Tampa Technik, for keeping his door open at all hours and patiently letting TDT work through problems and solutions, and scatter his tools. Thank you sharing the gifts of your experience, and your elegant design tutelage. The lessons and the time you’ve shared with team members will endure far beyond their World Championship experience.

Special thanks to, to our meeting hosting family, who always “left the light on” letting team members meet as often as needed, at whatever hours they could. All of our families are incredible! We’ve said it before, but we’ll say it again, without the Team Behind the Team, Team Duct Tape wouldn’t be as successful as it is!

Few teams get to go to the World Championship in the first place,and for TDT to have made it twice in our four years is something to be proud of! Dr. Woody Flowers, in one of his addresses, told us it was more meaningful to say you’re successful because you worked hard, not just because you’re smart – because if you just think you’re smart, you won’t try as hard to be successful. But people who believe they can be successful when they work hard, will always work hard to succeed. We believe our Team Duct Tape students are smart and they work hard, and we hope their class, professionalism and solid work ethic will continue to make them successful all the rest of their lives!