Chesapeake BRIDGES: Our STEM Talent Pipeline

Chesapeake BRIDGES: More Teams, More Access, More Futures

By Alex Bryant | President, FIRST Chesapeake

September 2026

Every FTC season in our district used to start the same way: a scramble. Registration opened, and coaches raced to grab a qualifier slot before their nearest one filled up. Teams two hours from the closest open spot lost out to teams five minutes away. It was first come, first served, and it rewarded proximity over need.

That changed this season.

Building the Infrastructure Behind the Scramble

This fall we kicked off the 2026–2027 season with seven BIOBUZZ Kickoff events across the region, and we're adding more to keep up with our growing teams. Our FRC community's rapid growth alone is driving us to add an eighth event this year, on top of expanding what BIOBUZZ itself can offer new and returning teams.

Behind the scenes, we retired the old scramble entirely. We built and launched a new registration app that lets our nearly 300 FTC teams secure their two qualifiers through a preference system instead of a first-come, first-served race. Coaches now rank what works for their team, and the system allocates from there. The result is not just fairer, it is more efficient: teams travel less, fields fill more evenly across the district, and a team in Southwest Virginia has the same shot at a nearby qualifier as a team in Northern Virginia. Equity, built directly into the infrastructure.

BRIDGES Network: Launching October 1

The same principle drives our newest initiative. On October 1, we launch the BRIDGES Network, connecting teams across the district to field access, machining capability, and mentor-to-mentor support, regardless of what their home program can provide on its own. A team without a practice field, a shop with a CNC machine, or an experienced mentor no longer has to build all three from scratch. They borrow them from the network.

Forty-Eight New Teams, and a District That Keeps Growing

More than 48 rookie FTC teams are launching this season, in rural counties and urban neighborhoods alike, extending our footprint into DC and Central and Southwest Virginia. Every one of those teams is proof that the access gap is not fixed, it is a matter of building the right infrastructure and putting it where students actually are.

Howard University: A Growing Partnership

This fall marks our third annual STEM Day at Howard University, and this year we are going further than a single event. We are launching a near-peer leadership program that pairs college-aged mentors with high school teams throughout the season. It is designed to work both ways: lead coaches get real support carrying the season, and the college students leading it get a genuine chance to apply leadership skills they are still building for themselves.

Looking Ahead

This season, we are focused on scaling what works: more events to support our growing teams, a fairer path to competition through our new registration system, a BRIDGES Network that puts shared resources within reach of every team, 48 FTC rookie teams finding their footing, and a deepening partnership with Howard University that puts near-peer mentors directly in the pit alongside our students.

Thank you for making this possible. Every gift you give helps us build the systems, not just the moments, that get students into engineering, into mentorship, and into futures they might not have reached otherwise.

What we are building is not robots. It is people.

With gratitude,

Alex Bryant

President, FIRST Chesapeake

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