Event Information

• You can find your event date, time, and location listed at the Michigan FLLE Events page.
• Your event assignment is at the Team List link at the top of the Events page. Please note that event placements are final, and not all teams were able to be placed into their first choice event.
• Your event host will reach out with additional details about two weeks before your event.

Event Readiness

• Rosters are due the Monday before your event to your event host. It can take time to get coaches screened and consent forms signed, so start now.
• You can find directions for completing your team’s required roster and consent forms at the Event Readiness page. If you have any questions on this process after reading through the Event Readiness page fully, please let me know.

MDE 99h Grant Closes Dec 2

• The MDE grant opened October 1 and is open until December 2 at noon.
• The MDE grant (often referred to as the “State Grant”) is now open. You can find the application in NexSys under “99h”. Please alert the person in your district responsible for submitting the grant. School personnel who are “Level 5s” (usually someone in finance, superintendent’s office, or principal) can access the NexSys grant system. This is a single application per school district or school (for those not in a district) submitted on behalf of all of the FIRST teams in that district or school. This grant is administrated by the MDE and not FIRST in Michigan. Once you know who is responsible for submitting it, please fill out this form in case we need to contact them.
• The RFP and other grant information for 2024-25 is no longer at techplan.org. It is now hosted on the Michigan.gov site.
• Teams must be affiliated by an MDE-recognized ISD, district, public or nonpublic school. The team must be registered for the 2024-25 season before the grant closes to be eligible for consideration. Teams must participate in one official FIM FLLE event in the 2024-25 season to meet the competition requirement of the grant.
• Payout of the grant is done by the MDE and usually occurs in March. Awarded grant funds are paid to the team’s fiscal partner i.e. district/school on behalf of the awarded teams in that district/school. Teams should work with their district/school to access the funding. Funding can solely be used by the team to which they were awarded.
• These are the maximum award amounts. The MDE has applied a blanket percentage reduction to the award payout amounts for the past few years in order to stay within the grant’s funding allocation. This is decided upon by the MDE and not FIRST in Michigan. This decision is not made until after the application closes and the MDE has had a chance to process all the grant applications.

  Level	Team Award	Coach Stipend (max per bldg)
  Rookie	$500	$1500
  Veteran	$300	$1500

DonorsChoose Opportunity

We have received word about a sponsor-driven DonorsChoose funding opportunity generously supported by 3M for teachers with FIRST teams. Follow the two steps below, and your project MAY be funded. Some notes: Funding cannot be used to cover the cost of team registrations. Smaller requests are more frequently funded.

1. Create your DonorsChoose project.
2. Apply for selective FIRST funding through this Google form managed by DonorsChoose.

Participation Reminder

• In Michigan, we run a slightly different progression of programs from FIRST national. In Michigan, FIRST LEGO League is an elementary school only program with teams comprised solely of elementary school aged/grade team members. To attend an event or receive any grants, FLLE teams must be aligned to the FIRST in Michigan progression of programs, consisting ONLY of students in Kindergarten through 3rd grade.
• FIRST LEGO League Explore team size is capped at 6. No exceptions are made, and smaller teams than this are highly encouraged (4-5 students.) Multiple teams out of a given school/organization are welcome.
• Each team will need two registered, screened coaches in order to register for events in Michigan. Coaches can be registered to multiple teams. All email communication will be sent to the two registered coaches, as well as the team admin if there is one registered.

MICHIGAN RESOURCES

These four important pages have all the information you need to run a Michigan FIRST LEGO League Explore team each year:

• Resources page – annotated, organized list of links to everything for running a team and this season
• Events page – important pages linked at the top to help you register for an attend an event
• Run-a-Team page – step-by-step guide to running a team from registration to attending an event
• Grants page – information about all grants available to new or returning teams

EBLASTS