Hi ,

In this week's blast:

⚙️ Kickoff 
⚙️ Kickoff Kit Pick Up 
⚙️ FIRST^® HQ Holiday Closures 
⚙️ Team Blast Schedule 
⚙️ Best Practices for Animation and Storytelling 
⚙️ Today's Gift, Tomorrow's Innovators 
⚙️ Build Season Timeline Resource

Program Updates, Deadlines, & Reminders

Watch the FIRST^® Robotics Competition 2026 Season Kickoff January 10, 12:00 p.m. ET on the FIRST Robotics Competition YouTube Channel: Featuring the game reveal of REBUILT™ presented by Haas, a message from FIRST^® CEO Chris Moore, and much more! Sign up for a tune-in reminder or find a local kickoff near you. 

Kickoff Kit Pick Up: Don’t forget as we get closer to Kickoff to make a plan for who is picking up the Kickoff Kit. The following people are allowed to pick up the Kit: 

🔹Lead Coach 1 or 2 for the team with photo ID. 

🔹Any mentor on the team over 18 (you may log in to your FIRST Dashboard as proof) with photo ID.

🔹A person over 18 that is listed on the Surrogate Kit Pick-up Letter with photo ID. 

➡️If a team is unable to pick-up their Kickoff Kit at the Local Kickoff selected, a surrogate may be designated to do so but the form must be submitted at least 2 days prior to Kickoff by the Lead Coach 1 or 2 or a team administrator. 

FIRST HQ Holiday Closures: FIRST Headquarters will close at 3:00 p.m. ET on Wednesday, December 24, 2025, and will resume normal business hours on Monday, December 29, 2025. FIRST Headquarters will also be closed on Thursday, January 1, 2026. 

Team Blast Schedule: There will be no FIRST Robotics Competition Team Blast the week of December 22 and the blast the week of December 29 will be sent on December 31. The normal weekly schedule will resume on January 8.

Best Practices for Animation and Storytelling: Webinar 2 of 2 on the FIRST Digital Animation Award: Join students from the Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) Interactive Media and Game Development program on January 5, 7:00-9:00 p.m. ET for a FREE webinar to learn about best practices for animation and storytelling, and the opportunity to get valuable feedback on your award videos in advance of the submission deadline, January 12!  

WPI is offering a team grant to the winning team ($6,300 value) and a $1,000 WPI scholarship to ANY student who is a member of a team that submits an entry. More details on the Digital Animation Award webpage. Register Now!  

By signing up for the webinar, you will be asked to supply personal data to WPI for this event. This data will be subject to WPI’s privacy policy. You should review WPI’s privacy policy and understand how your data will be used before sharing your information.

Today's Gift, Tomorrow's Innovators: Act before December 31: Our community makes FIRST possible. Your time, mentorship, advocacy, and generosity fuel life-changing STEM experiences for students everywhere. A year-end gift today ensures more young people can build their skills, dream big, and #GetAnywhere. Make your impact before December 31 and help FIRST finish strong! Donate today. 

Resource of the Week: This week’s resource is our Build Season Timeline which is a very high-level schedule for how to approach the Build Season. Many factors affect this schedule including years of experience, number of students/mentors, machining resources, actual time between kickoff and your first event, etc. Teams should feel free to modify this timeline to what works best for each team as there is no single right way to how a team should approach Build Season. (excel file – automatically downloads) 

Upcoming Important Dates:

⚙️ Saturday, January 10 at 12:00 p.m. ET – 2026 FIRST Robotics Competition Kickoff 

⚙️ Saturday, January 10 at 1:00 p.m. ET - Kickoff Kit of Parts Replacement System Opens, FIRST Choice: Priority Lists Opens, and Virtual Kit Kickoff Release Opens