Awards

Detailed award and judging information will be added into the Competition Manual in late May.

In the interim, this page describes the awards available at the Carolinas Premier Event. Teams are strongly encouraged to submit a PORTFOLIO that complies with the criteria in A101 in the INTO THE DEEP Competition Manual.

Awards at the Carolinas Premier Event are split into three categories.

Standard awards

We will have two standard judged awards:

• Inspire (described in the INTO THE DEEP Competition Manual, section 6.2.1)

• Think (described in the INTO THE DEEP Competition Manual, section 6.2.2)

Standard awards, with a twist

In place of the Design, Control, and Innovate awards, we will have a single award that recognizes the technical accomplishments of teams in the planning, design, construction, operations and controls of their robot. This award's criteria are a combination of the standard Design, Control, and Innovate award criteria found in sections 6.2.5 through 6.2.7 of the INTO THE DEEP competition manual.

• Mechanical Marvel - Machine, Creativity, Innovation (MCI) 

In place of the Connect and Motivate awards, we will have a single award that will recognize teams who have developed strong partnerships with their community. This award's criteria are a combination of the standard Connect and Motivate award criteria found in sections 6.2.3 through 6.2.4 of the INTO THE DEEP Competition manual.

• Collaborative Catalyst - Team Attributes (TA)

CPE unique awards

Artificial Intelligence Trailblazer Award

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is growing technology; this award is to help recognize how a team is effectively using these tools as an additional component in the advancement of their team and robot goals.

Criteria:

• Required: Team must submit documentation for this award. It can be either as content in their portfolio or provided as a separate document during the judged interview and must include:

  • What problem the team was trying to solve

  • What AI Tool(s) were used

  • How the team used AI to enhance their goals

• Required: Team must provide documentation and/or evidence of how AI was used/applied and must describe the benefits and challenges of using AI for a specific task.

• Encouraged: Team could describe how they adapted their approach based on the output from the AI generated tools.

• Encouraged: Team can describe and explain how the data was evaluated or trained for additional use cases for the team.

• Encouraged: Team can provide a reflection on how their problem solving process would have been different without the use of AI.

Signature Style Award

Showcase your team identity and brand! The Signature Style Award celebrates attractiveness in engineering and outstanding visual aesthetic integration of machine and team appearance.  

Criteria:

• Required: The team can explain how their team logo or image is fitting to the objectives, character, and/or history of the team.

• Encouraged: Visuals of the integrated team and machine are exciting and can be recognized as part of a theme.

• Encouraged: Team has uploaded an avatar to the FTC Scoring system.

Transformation Triumph Award

This award celebrates a team that embraces the art of transformation, demonstrates remarkable ingenuity and adaptability, and has a delightfully mischievous spirit. This team constantly evolved their robot’s design in unexpected ways, pushed the boundaries of innovation, and explored through countless iterations unlocking their robot’s full potential through shape-shifting adaptation. This award recognizes the unique ability to combine technical excellence with creative flair, bringing great ideas from concept to reality.

Criteria:

• Required: Team must showcase and describe how their robot has transformed between their final Qualifier, League Meet, Super Qualifying or District competition and the Carolinas Premier Event.

• Required: Robot or sub-assembly must be stable, robust, and work reliably most of the time.

• Encouraged: Team has documented their lessons learned with each iteration.

Robo Rhapsody Award

This award celebrates teams that creatively and humorously share information about their team, their INTO THE DEEP season, or their robot through an engaging video that is a parody of an existing song. This award recognizes originality, lyrical ingenuity, video production quality, and the effectiveness of conveying team-related information in an entertaining way and showcases their FIRST Core Values.

Criteria:

• Required: Video is between 45 and 90 seconds.

• Required: Teams must clearly state the original song they are parodying in their submission

• Required: Video must be submitted by July 21st, 2025 at 11:59pm Eastern Daylight Time (UTC -04:00). Details of the submission process, including required video formats, will be released by June 15th.

• Encouraged: The information shared:

  • Genuinely relates to the team, season or robot 

  • Connection to the song is recognizable 

• Encouraged: The video should have high production values.