A Mission Statement-The public schools in Garrett County were chartered to serve the public interest. That interest lies in the maintenance of an educated citizenry necessary for the survival of a free society. The Garrett County Board of Education exists to provide teaching and learning environments which will enable our students to maximize their God-given full potential. Young adults should emerge from our schools possessing a knowledge of the basics, including but not limited to: proficiency in reading, writing, and speaking English; knowledge and appreciation of American and world history, classical culture and literary traditions, and understanding and applying basic scientific and mathematical principles.FIRST Team 1629 GaCo, has completed their 2012 competition season with much recognition. The team recently traveled to St. Louis, MO for the 2012 FIRST World Championships where they competed in the Newton division, and battled to a 4-5 record. Team 1629 won the 2012 Championship Engineering Inspiration Award, an award celebrating a team’s outstanding success in advancing respect and appreciation for engineering within a team’s school and community, this is the second most prestigious award a team receive.Team 1629 also competed in the Chesapeake Regional and the Buckeye Regional. The Chesapeake Regional held in Baltimore, MD, was the first competition of the year for the team where they garnered a 6-3 record and lost in the quarter finals round of the competition, and also won the Rockwell Automation Innovation in Control Award, celebrating an innovative control system or application of control components to provide unique machine functions. At the Buckeye Regional held in Cleveland, OH, Team 1629 once again did not disappoint. GaCo had a 6-4 record at this event and ended up losing in the semi-finals. Once again the team received some well earned hardware, winning the Regional Chairman’s Award, FIRST’s most prestigious award at a regional event. The award qualified the team to compete in the World Championships.