Tesla’s Rahil Mehta, a FIRST alum and mentor, works with students on FIRST Robotics Competition Team 668 in San Jose, California.

"I’ve always been a car person, but what also attracted me to Tesla was that the culture was very similar to being on a FIRST Robotics Competition team, which is what inspired me to become an engineer.You really don’t have unlimited resources, and you have to be careful about how you use the resources you have and plan for that. All the engineers that work here are super passionate about the work. There are long nights, but everyone is working toward a goal, and everyone wants to get it done at a high level.

We get a lot of really good, talented employees through the FIRST program. I organized an information session recently at Tesla HQ to encourage employees to get involved in FIRST and invited three teams to be a part of, including the one I mentor. A few days later, a hiring manager who attended the event to learn about FIRST came up to me. He said we just interviewed an intern candidate who is involved in the program, and he was by far the best candidate they had ever interviewed. Part of that was the FIRST experience and the huge amount of technical skills they picked up through FIRST.” – Rahil Mehta, FIRST Alum & Tesla Sr. Firmware Engineer

Read about how Tesla is investing in getting a competitive robotics program into every high school in Nevada as part of its efforts to build a sustainable workforce pipeline.

#IRL ("In Real Life")

"In Real Life" is a digital campaign showcasing parallels between the skills, experiences, and values of FIRST youth and working professionals.