– FIRST Tech Challenge DECODE Season Guide

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What is theFIRST^® Tech Challenge Leadership Award?
The FIRST^® Leadership Award recognizes the dedication and individual contributions of outstanding
secondary school students participating on FIRST^® Tech Challenge or FIRST^® Robotics Competition
teams. Students in 10th or 11th grade are eligible to be nominated by their team for
the FIRST^® Leadership Award for excelling in areas such as leadership, entrepreneurship, and dedication
to advancing the mission of FIRST^® within their communities. There are three (3) levels
of FIRST^® Leadership Award students.

FIRST^® Leadership Award Semi-finalists

– comprised of the two (2) students in their 10th or
11th school year nominated by each team.
FIRST^® Leadership Award Finalists
- The students selected for each regional championship.
FIRST^® Leadership Award Winners
- comprised of the ten (10) FIRST^® Robotics Competition and
ten (10) FIRST^® Tech Challenge students selected from the applicable FIRST^® Leadership
AwardFinalists.
The students who earn FIRST^® Leadership Awardstatus as either a Semi-finalist, Finalist or Winner,
are great examples of student leaders who have led their teams and communities to increased
awareness for FIRST^® and its mission, champion FIRST^® Core Values such asInclusion, and
embody Gracious Professionalism^®. It is the goal of FIRST that FIRST^® Leadership AwardWinners will
continue, post-award, as great leaders,student alumni, and advocates of FIRST^®.
In 2019, theWoodie Flowers Memorial Grantwas established for FIRST^® Leadership AwardWinners
pursuing STEAM fields of study. This grant is awarded to a student selected from among the prior
year’s FIRST^® Robotics Competition and FIRST^® Tech Challenge Leadership Awardwinners.
Student Eligibility
Every registered FIRST^® Tech Challenge team can submit up to two (2) students as FIRST^® Leadership
Award semi-finalists.
• Students must be a sophomore (grade 10) or junior (grade 11) to be eligible for this award.
o Note: For regions of the world that do not use grade levels such as this to identify years
of schooling: This award is intended for students who are two (2) to three (3) years away
from entering college or university. Students that would be attending college or
university in the next academic year are not eligible. Mentors will be asked for the year of
graduation during the nomination process.
• The coach or mentor nominating the student(s) must submit an essay explaining why the
student should receive this award. The essay must be 4,000 characters or less.
FIRSTLeadership Award Criteria
Criteria for selection of the FIRST^® Leadership Award shall include, but not be limited to a student’s:
• Demonstrated leadership and commitment to the FIRST^® Core Values 
• Effectiveness at increasing awareness of FIRST^® in their school and community 
• Demonstrates passion for a long-term commitment to FIRST^® 
• Individual contributions to their team contribute to the overall success of the team
• Proven experience in areas of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM)
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• The student is a role model and can motivate and lead fellow team members 
Important FIRST^® Leadership Award Season Dates
FIRSTLeadership Award Important Dates
September 6, 2025 Nominations open
December 15, 2025 Nominations due
February 15, 2026
Finalist selections due to FIRST^®
Various
RCMP’s announce finalists
April 2026
Winners announced at FIRST^® Championship

FIRSTLeadership Award Events
New in the 2025-2026 season, Program Delivery Partners are no longer required to create their own
FIRST^® Leadership Award Interview event. Events will be created by FIRST^® for all regions prior to Kickoff.
All regions will follow the same deadline for all FIRST^® Leadership Award nominations, as outlined in the
next section.
Program Delivery Partners, however, must access their FIRST^® Leadership Award event using the FIRST^®
Tech Challenge scoring system to set up the window in which the region will be holding interviews. The
interview windows must only happen within the date ranges of December 15, 2025 through February
15th, 2026. Please be aware that Finalists are due to FIRST^® on February 15th, so interviews should be
schedule prior to this date to provide enough time for finalist selection.
To select the window for your region, please see FIRST Leadership Award Events – Editing
Interview Datessection of this document for step-by-step instructions.
What is the Deadline for Team Nominations?
The deadline for all teams to nominate students is December 15th, 2025 at 11:59pm Eastern time.
All regions will have a
nomination deadline of
December 15th at
11:59pm eastern time.

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Interview Timeline
Nominations Due
Interview Window

Interview Window
Interview Window
Finalists Due

FIRSTLeadership Award Evaluation Structure
The chart below is a visual aid to show how each category feeds into specific levels of competition,
starting with the coach making the nominations. FIRST^® Leadership Award interviewers are responsible
for interviewing semi-finalists (nominees). Interviews are done either in person at a traditional event, or
remotely (this will be region dependent, please check with your local program delivery partner). The
FIRST^® Leadership Award reviewer will then review the nominations and the interviewer notes within a
state/region to determine which students will move to the next level as FIRST^® Leadership Award
finalists. Depending upon the size of the region, there will be 2-4 FIRST^® Leadership Award finalists
within each state or region (see Number of Advancing Finalists by Regionfor further details).
These finalists will be announced at the Regional Championship Tournament. A separate panel called
the FIRST^® Leadership Award Committee will review the FIRST^® Leadership Award finalists and choose
the 10 FIRST^® Tech Challenge Leadership Award winners.

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FIRSTLeadership Award Volunteer Roles
Overview
There are two volunteer roles that are required to evaluate the FIRST^® Leadership Award; the FIRST^®
Leadership Award Interviewer and the FIRST^® Leadership Award Reviewer.
FIRSTLeadership Award Interviewer
FIRST^® Leadership Award Interviewers main responsibility is to interview semi-finalists; however, there
are other responsibilities the interviewer must take on before and after the event. These responsibilities
include:
• Review nominations prior to the event.
• Interview the Semi-finalist during the event.
• Write a narrative about the interview after the event.
The FIRST^® Leadership Award Interviewer is not responsible for selecting the finalists for their region.
Interviewers gather information to pass along to the FIRST^® Leadership Award Reviewers via a written
narrative to assist the Reviewers in their role of selecting the region’s Finalists.
FIRSTLeadership Award Reviewer
The FIRST^® Leadership Award Reviewers are responsible for selecting the FIRST^® Leadership Award
Finalists. There will be at least two reviewers in a region that work together to select the finalists for
that particular region. The reviewers must access theJudges Portalto view the original nomination as
well as the notes from the FIRST^® Leadership Award interviewers. Once all of the nominations and notes
have been taken into consideration, the reviewers are responsible for choosing the number of Finalists
allocated for that region. FIRST^® Leadership Award reviewers do not need to be present at the event;
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rather they review each semi-finalist and enter the Finalists in the Judges Portal.This information will
feed up to the regional championship PDP.
Number of Advancing Finalists by Region
The number of semi-finalists that will move onto the next level as finalists depends upon the region.
Regions with larger team numbers will have additional spots to advance students. Prior to the start of
each season, finalist numbers are reevaluated. The following chart shows how finalist numbers are
determined:
Number of Teams Number of Finalists
0 – 49
2
50 – 139
3
140 +
4

The lists below outline the number of advancing finalists by region:
North America
2 Finalists
3 Finalists
4 Finalists
• Alabama
• Alberta, Canada
• California – LA
• Alaska
• Arizona
• California – NorCal
• Arkansas
• British Columbia, Canada
• Chesapeake
• Connecticut
• California – San Diego
• Florida
• Delaware
• Colorado
• Georgia
• Four Corners
• Indiana
• Illinois
• Hawaii
• Mexico
• Iowa
• Idaho
• Mississippi
• Massachusetts
• Kentucky
• New Hampshire
• Minnesota
• Louisiana
• New York – Excelsior
• Missouri
• Montana
• New York – NYC
• New Jersey
• Nebraska
• Ohio
• North Carolina
• Nevada
• Oklahoma
• Pennsylvania
• Newfoundland and
• Ontario, Canada
• Texas – Central*
Labrador
• Oregon
• Texas - Houston
• New Mexico
• South Carolina
• Texas – North*
• New York – Long Island
• Texas – West and
• Washington
• North Dakota
Panhandle*
• Puerto Rico
• Wisconsin
• Quebec, Canada
• Rhode Island
• South Carolina
• Tennessee
• Texas – South*
• Utah
• Vermont
• Wyoming
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*Although these regions are now merged, they will continue to have separate allocations for the FIRST^®
Leadership Award.
International
2 Finalists
3 Finalists
4 Finalists
• Chinese Taipei
• Australia
• Kazakhstan
• Germany
• Benelux (Belgium,
• Romania
• Greece
Netherlands, Luxembourg)
• United Kingdon and
• Hungary
• Brazil
Ireland
• Indonesia
• China
• Italy
• DoD
• Lithuania
• India
• Malaysia
• Israel
• Morocco
• Jamaica
• New Zealand
• Libya
• Nigeria
• Republic of Korea
• Poland
• South Africa
• Qatar
• Türkiye
• Saudi Arabia
• Thailand
• Vietnam

Judges Portal
The Judges Portal is the tool used to track nominations, interviewers’ notes, and selected finalists.
https://my.firstinspires.org/Judging/See the Judges Portal Instructionsfor more details.
Partner Access to the Portal
Program delivery partners have been granted access to the portal and should be able to view all of their
events within the region. This will allow each partner to track the nominations, recruit enough
volunteers based on the number of nominations, and ensure that notes have been submitted for each
nomination.
Granting Access to Volunteers
In order to allow a volunteer access to the portal, they must first apply to the role of FIRST^® Leadership
Award interviewer or FIRST^® Leadership Award reviewer in the Volunteer Registration System. Once they
have applied, they must be assigned by the PDP or volunteer coordinator to the role in the Volunteer
Management System (VMS). The assignment in the VMS is what grants the Volunteer access to the
Judges Portal.
Once the volunteer has been assigned to the role, they will only be able to access the event in which
they have been assigned.
Note: If the Volunteer will be fulfilling the role at multiple events, they
must be assigned to each event.
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Recruiting Volunteers
Since partners have access to all nominations within their region, they should be sure to check the
number of nominations when the nomination timeframe closes. Knowing how many nominations there
are for an event is necessary to recruit enough volunteers to interview the semi-finalists.
Recruiting Interviewers
FIRST^® Leadership Award interviewers have two very important responsibilities: interviewing the semi-
finalist and writing up notes after the interview. When recruiting for this position, keep in mind that the
interviewer should have strong writing skills, and experience with interviewing is preferred. College
admissions officers, or someone in a similar field, would make a great interviewer.
At a minimum, there must be two Interviewers on staff to conduct FIRST^® Leadership Award interviews.
A panel of two interviewers should be able to interview up to five Semi-finalists. If there are more than
five interviews, an additional panel of interviewers may be needed.
Recruiting Reviewers
The reviewers have the important task of reading through multiple nominations, notes from the
interviewers, and making a decision on which candidates should move to the next level of competition
as finalists. There are no rules that state an interviewer cannot serve as a reviewer, however it’s
important to remind them to keep an open mind to all of the candidates and choose the candidates that
most closely match the award criteria.
There must be at least two reviewers assessing the candidate’s essays and interview notes. Some
regions choose to form a committee to work through all the nominations and make the decision on the
Finalists.
Recognition at Events
Semi-finalist Recognition
Students nominated as semi-finalists should be proud of their accomplishments and should be
recognized for these accomplishments. Below are two ways to recognize semi-finalists at the event.
Semi-finalist Pins
FIRST has created semi-finalist pins to be given out to students interviewed at an event. These can
either be provided after the interview, or if the PDP chooses, can be handed out at the closing ceremony
to recognize the student in front of their peers.
NOTE: The pins will be mailed in December 2025 directly to the Program
Delivery Partners. PDPs should arrange to have pins sent to their event
hosts who have FIRST^® Leadership Award Semi-finalists at their event.
Closing Ceremonies Recognition
PDP’s and event hosts are encouraged to invite their semi-finalists to the center stage for recognition at
the closing ceremonies if time allows. This is a very public way for the student to be recognized for
their nomination. Some events also choose to announce the names of the semi-finalists and have them
stand in the audience for applause. This should only be done at qualifying tournaments or league
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tournaments. The awards scripts created for the Emcee include a script for the FIRST^® Leadership
Award semi-finalists.
However, inviting students to the stage should not be done at a Regional Championship Tournament.
Since Finalists are announced at the State/Region Championship, the Semi-finalist(s) that do not
advance should not have to walk off the stage after not moving to the next level. Only do this at
Qualifying Tournaments or League Tournaments.
Finalist Recognition Certificates
Each Finalist should receive a certificate in honor of their achievements. FIRST^® will send out the
appropriate number of finalist certificates to each region along with certificate folders to present to the
finalists at the award ceremonies. The event host or PDP will need to fill in the finalist’s name and the
date of the event prior to passing out the certificate. If you have not received blank certificates, please
emailFTC-LeadershipAward@firstinspires.org.
NOTE: The certificates will be mailed in December 2025.

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FIRSTLeadership Award FAQ’s
Can a student be nominated for both FIRST Tech Challenge and FIRST^® Robotics Competition
Leadership Award?
Both FIRST^® Robotics Competition and FIRST^® Tech Challenge students are eligible to be nominated as a
FIRST^® Leadership Award semi-finalist within their program. There are no rules that state that a student
that participates in both programs cannot be nominated for the FIRST^® Leadership Award for both
programs.
Do Semi-finalists get a second interview at the Regional Championship?
No, semi-finalists for FIRST^® Tech Challenge will only have one interview before the regional
championship tournament.
Do Finalists get a second interview at the FIRST^® Championship?
No. The FIRST^® Leadership Award Committee for FIRST^® Tech Challenge reviews all the finalists
nominations essays and interviewer notes prior to the FIRST^® Championship. The winners of the award
are selected prior to the event and announced at the FIRST^® Championship.
Can Submissions Be Made Past the Deadline?
There will be no exceptions to the deadline. FIRST^® Tech Challenge will not accept submissions after the
deadline unless there is a verifiable issue with the Team’s dashboard. Please forward any requests to
FTC-LeadershipAward@firstinspires.org.
Who Submits the Nomination?
Please refer to theFIRST^® Leadership Award Nomination Guidefor info on who can submit the
nomination, as well as a walkthrough of submitting the nomination through the dashboard.

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Judges Portal Instructions
Review Nominations
Link to Portal:https://my.firstinspires.org/Judging/
• Click “Login” at the upper righthand corner. This will redirect to the www.firstinspires.org
login page.

• Log in using your username and password for your www.firstinspires.orgaccount.

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• Once logged in, click “FTC – Leadership Award”

• Click “Edit/View” to access the nominations for the event.

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• Click “Details” to access each individual nomination

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• The student information, along with the essay from the coach will be shown on this screen.
Make sure to read through the nomination essay prior to interviewing each student.
• NEW! Preferred Name – If the student has a preferred name, it will be listed in parenthesis
next to their legal name.
Important:If a preferred name is present, please be sure to use the
preferred name when addressing the student during their interview.

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Select Finalists
• Locate the regional championship event from the Judges Portal and click “Edit/View”.

• The finalist must be selected in the portal to be reported to FIRST^®. Select each finalist from
the dropdown and click “save”.

Finalists will receive a notification email from FIRST^® after the event has taken place, and after the
student has been announced as a finalist at the regional championship.

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FIRSTLeadership Award Events – Editing Interview Dates
To edit the dates in your FIRST^® Leadership Award Interview event, follow these steps:

Log intohttps://ftc-scoring.firstinspires.org

Select your region using the hyperlink once you are logged in.
Select your FIRST^® Leadership Award Interviews event

from the event list. Note that prior to
selecting your interview date window, this will show “Unscheduled”.

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Once the FIRST^® Leadership Award Interviews event

is selected, the following popup window will
appear. Enter the interview start date, interviews end date, and your local time zone.
Some important things to consider when selecting your dates:
a. If the date range is more than 7 days, only the last 7 days will be visible in VMS, Event
Search Results, and in the Volunteer dashboard.
b. Finalists are due to FIRST^® on February 15th, 2026. Make sure to provide enough time for
interviews to be completed, and for the FIRST^® Leadership Award Reviewers to make
Finalists selections prior to the deadline.

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Click “Save”.
If the interview dates

selected are more than 7 days, only a 7 day window counting back from
the end date will be shown

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Useful Links and Information
On-Call Support Numbers
On-Call Support
These numbers are for volunteer support only. Teams should not use these numbers
to call about rulings or technical assistance.

Administrative, Judge, Referee and Non-Technical Issues:
(603)206-2412

Scoring System (FTC Live) or other Technical Issues:

(603)206-2450
Call or use the built-in chat feature on FTC Live available for events with internet
access
Pre-Event Support
Mon – Fri
8:30am – 5:00pm Eastern Time (UTC-4 or UTC-5)
Contact Supportincluding live chat or emailcustomerservice@firstinspires.org

Program Resources
FIRST^® Tech Challenge Website
Event Search

Game and Season Resources
FIRST^® Tech Challenge Blog

Volunteer Resources
Team Email Blasts

Feedback
We strive to create support materials that are the best they can be. If you have feedback about this
manual, please emailcustomerservice@firstinspires.orgor bycontacting support. Thank you!
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Document Outline

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