Traverse City Central High School - AP Calculus/ runs Sci-Ma-Tech program - 4 years participation in FIRST
What we've heard about Mr. Failor:
"Mr. Failor is in charge of the funding- he writes tons of grants and talks to possible sponsors. Without him, we would have no team. He also gets us all of our materials. Formerly he helped extensively with the building, but he has found us so many amazing mentors that he tends to let them do the building and focuses on various behind-the-scenes type stuff. This year he organized the first ever FIRST competition at a high school almost single-handedly."
John Failor is the only reason Traverse City Central has a FIRST robotics team. He helped get it started four years ago, and has been the leader since then. Mr. Failor prowls the community in search of mentors and sponsors, and writes grants for us as well. He helped get us actual space to build our robot when our old room was torn down during renovations from a district reorganization that took down the unused classroom Team 1711 had appropriated. Hotel rooms and drivers for the competition are all arranged by him, as is the necessary school paperwork. From a logistical and administrative standpoint, Mr. Failor is the team.
This is not to say that he does not help build the robot. Although this year he had some more pressing concerns (discussed later), in past years Mr. Failor has been to nearly every meeting to help design and build the robot. He is not trained in engineering or any related profession, but is there to help in any way he can. At competitions, he cannot speak by the end of the first day from his insanely loud cheering. I was shocked when I first noticed him in the stands; he is a very calm and quiet individual otherwise. The transformation when he cheers for his team is endearing and hilarious. 2008-2009 has been a different year for FIRST in Michigan. My team knows this better than most; we barely saw Mr. Failor during the build season because he was so busy with a larger problem: the first ever FIRST competition at a high school.
Traverse City hosted our own competition in February, and Mr. Failor set the whole thing up from catering to shipping in the playing field to recruiting tons of volunteers to getting the gym classes rerouted to other places for two days. The amount of work he did is astonishing- I have yet to fully plumb the depths of his labor. Every time I think I have seen the full picture, I get and email about some new thing he has done for FIRST and/or our team. The man is unbelievable. As a side note, Mr. Failor also teaches AP BC Calculus several hours a day and is the director of the Sci-Ma-Tech program at Central, which one class per grade of advanced students in science, math, and technology. He meets with parents about the program, gets funding for it, and sets up field trips, internships, and speakers for the enrolled students.
He is an excellent calculus teacher too; I have had him as have many people I know, and we all agree he is a good teacher who makes us substantially less worried about the AP test than we would otherwise be. In conclusion, Mr. Failor does a phenomenal job at myriad different tasks. He is an outstanding teacher in his own right, and when one takes his work on FIRST into account one is forced to wonder if he ever sleeps. Team 1711 owes him our existence, and he has helped all of FIRST as well through his work on our District competition."
WWJ Newsradio 950 is Detroit's only all-news radio station and is the leader in Detroit radio news. Listen online to WWJ-AM 950 for live, local Detroit news, up-to-the-minute Detroit traffic, Detroit sports, Detroit business and Detroit community information. WWJ Newsradio 950 is an award winning radio station and you can listen online and podcast on demand Detroit news, Detroit Construction Alerts, Detroit School Closings, Winter Survival Guide and learn more about our Business Breakfasts. www.wwj.com.
E-Mail Story
Print Story
