Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

This is my first year mentoring and I'm fortunate enough to be working with a very well established team. Personally, I think bagging is a bad idea that gives a huge advantage to veteran well-funded teams and penalizes new teams and ones without a lot of financial resources.

At the very least, it seems like exceptions should be made for first year teams and/or teams that have had trouble raising funds. I'd prefer everyone be able to work on their robots up until inspection, that way we can all bring our very best to the field.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

That is the best idea that I've heard so far. us rookies have such a disadvantage. :mad:

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

One thing to note is that not all of a team's funding is required to come from what would be considered as a sponsor in the normal way. Team 1619, over the fall, had a leaf raking business that was student run and organized to raise money. We got the idea from a previous Team Driven (1730) mentor who is now a mentor of us. They do lawn aeration in the falls to raise money, but that does require some equipment. Regardless of how you do it, every little bit of money counts! That lawn mowing is what is allowing us to attend a second regional competition this year.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Just wondering:


What if no one would sponsor a team?

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

The thing with this argument is that usually, people make it as a way of saying "Those teams that are always at the top? We could beat them if only we were given more time.", completely forgetting that the only way to give you more time fairly is to ALSO give the powerhouse teams more time. Those powerhouse teams? They're already making better use of the time they're given than the complaining teams, that's why they're powerhouses. Giving them more time will only serve to make the performance gap bigger, not smaller.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I know of a team that builds 3 robots: 1 comp and 2 practice. This allows them to practice and program at the same time. Even if this rule was taken away they would still build at least 2 robots, because it really isn't that much more work to build 2 robots. It really comes down to teams doing anything they can to get an edge over the competition.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

You wouldn't have a team? Or the team fundraises all of the funds for itself, check out the FIRST Fundraising Toolkit if you are interested in ways to increase funding for your team.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

There exists some grants, and some regional FRC directors have access to some cash to give out on a case by case basis, but if your team can't find a sponsor at all? Its probably because you're not doing a very good job of singing the praises of the program.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

One of my biggest FRC related pet peeves is rookie teams pulling the "woe is us" card.

I can think of plenty of examples, from several recent FRC seasons, of rookies that show up and perform well on AND off the field.

2013: 4814, 4451
2012: 4334
2007: 2056

I really, truly believe that FRC does a pretty good job of being able to transcend socioeconomic status of its participants, and that in 99% of cases, the result a team has is directly proportional to the effort they put in, and has little-to-nothing to do with the socioeconomic status of the teams members OR its geographical area.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. The powerhouses aren't great because they have great sponsors. They have great sponsors because they have a great program that the sponsors feel is worthwhile to support.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I agree. After we won Rookie All Star it was a lot easier to get sponser support. With the extra sponsership we started a new team, who also won Rookie All Star. Now mind you, neither #3381 nor #4531 has ever finished in the top 15% of teams.

Even if it is easier, our students still go out every year and give 30+ sponsorship presentations to companies all over our area. A lot of our sponser only give between $500 to $1000, but due to the sheer number of sponsers we have, our program supports 2 FRC teams, 2 FTC, and ~15FLL teams.

The harder the students work, the more funding they can get.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I can testify that winning Rookie All-Star is not an instant ticket to money and sponsors; we're still struggling for monetary support at 4464 and it most certainly isn't for lack of effort.

I think this is really, incredibly naive; I believe this about as much as I believe FIRST cures cancer or rescues cute kittens. Socioeconomic disadvantage is a deep-rooted social problem that no high-school program is going to completely (or even mostly) transcend.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Perhaps your approach could use work?

Its usually not terribly effective throwing a sponsorship packet onto the desk of some company exec that essentially says "give us money... because.... yeah, we do this robotics thing... and it like... helps kids... somehow."

In my experience, the most effective sponsorship seeking is done by the students, not the mentors. It seems to be most effective if the students can meet with the prospective sponsor, and have a conversation in the student's own words about why the program is important to them, and what they get out of it. It's also important to demonstrate to the sponsor how the program gives back. Maybe your team raises money for cancer research, or builds robots to help enrich the lives of disabled people, or other community support things. When sponsors see a team that is helping their community, and is visible? Its MUCH easier to get sponsorship, because a sponsor can look at the team doing these things and say yes, I want to put my name on that.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I find your assumptions about and caricature of our fundraising efforts (which you really don't know anything about) rather insulting. Please, be a bit more respectful.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

If you think I'm being naive, can you show some real data that proves that on average teams that hail from regions with higher socioeconomic status do better than teams from poorer areas? I just don't believe the socioeconomic status of the region a team comes from has much to do with their success.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I'm not pulling that card. I'm just saying that some other teams may have problems. My team doesn't have a second anything.

I think that our robot is awesome. We'll have no trouble with it, but it would be nice to practice.