As always, we end our coverage with our good friend Terri Willingham. Terri is known in the community not for sitting around talking about what might be possible, but instead for getting things done. Because of this, there are a lot of really exciting programs in the Tampa area to help promote education, engineering and the maker culture.
Between ROBOTICON, Gulf Coast MakerCon, TEDxTampaRiverwalk and a myriad of programs based in libraries. She has also been involved in building makerspaces in libraries and even co-authored a book on the topic and trains library staff on the culture.
In addition to all of this, Terri is also Regional Director of FIRST in Central Florida. She sat down with us to talk about this event, future FIRST events in the area, including the upcoming Orlando FRC Regional, and her other events, including TEDxYouth@TampaRiverwalk in November and the next Gulf Coast MakerCon in April.
Scott is a developer who has worked on projects of varying sizes, including all of the PLUGHITZ Corporation properties. He is also known in the gaming world for his time supporting the rhythm game community, through DDRLover and hosting tournaments throughout the Tampa Bay Area. Currently, when he is not working on software projects or hosting F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, Scott can often be found returning to his high school days working with the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), mentoring teams and helping with ROBOTICON Tampa Bay. He has also helped found a student software learning group, the ASCII Warriors, currently housed at AMRoC Fab Lab.
Daniele is a student at Florida Polytechnic University who is studying Computer Science with a concentration in Cyber Security. In High School, she was introduced to the science and technology world through the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), a robotics foundation where students of varying ages can compete through tasks that their robots perform. With help from mentors she met through FIRST, she became interested in programming and developing. Today, Daniele is a special events host for F5 Live: Refreshing Technology and PLuGHiTz Live Special Events and a co-host for both The New Product Launchpad and FIRST Looks.
