Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

I am wondering the same thing octothorpe is. How much sleep do you guys get? For me, if i dont get atleast seven hours of sleep i start to go a little crazy. if we got out at 8:00 then I would have until 11 to finish my homework. not counting dinner.

thanks,vivek

p.s. are caffine pills allowed in FIRST?:ahh:

Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

Not much. :p

Seriously, as the robot ship date nears, the more dedicated (or fanatical) students spend more time at the shop than they do at home. That includes sleep and meals. But we encourage people to do their homework at the shop, where they incidentally have the benefit of others who can help them if they have trouble.
Mountain Dew certainly is. :)

Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

HA! 7 hours is way more than enough.

As John said, Team 237 meets from 4-8 every week night of build (Mon-Friday) with a dinner stop from 6-6:30ish or less depending on how busy we are.

To build on that, students are not required to attend any meeting by any means, but if you promise to do something for the team you are expected to be there to finish that promise. (ie: Mechanical team member making a part, electrical team member getting supplies, etc.. etc...)

School comes first with all students. Grades are more important than meetings or the team itself, so if they need extra time to study the day before a big test (even if it's the dreded week 6) the student is expected to make arrangements for that.

During the last 2-3 weekends of build, some get together if extra time is needed.

Also, as far as dinner goes, student's are not expected (I don't think) to supply at least one meal for the team, but it goes towards your participation credit when you do.

ie: A student cooks for the team for 5 nights out of the 6 weeks will get more participation credit in that aspect than one who only cooked 1 night, but the dinners are all still appreciated. The line of this agreement is fuzzy, but we plan this in December, or @ kickoff if we are running late. We have at least 6 weeks worh of time to fill on that food calendar, so a donated dinner is better than a dinner the team would have to purchase out of pocket, or a night gone by without food.

In the 7 years I have been on my team, we have not missed a night of food if we knew about the meeting in advance. In the case we plan a surprise meeting, it's usually handled (fairly) smoothly by all who attend how to eat that day. lol

And btw, caffeine pills are not encouraged. They provide a false sense of awareness (especially when driving - we won't go much farther into that story right now. :rolleyes: lol)
Liquid versions of caffeine are greatly consumed tho by every FIRST team. (Mountain Dew, Monster, or Bawls are the preferred forms on 237 from what I have seen.) :D

Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

Most likely our team will meet every weeknight from about 5:00-9:00. That gives the mentors time at their real job, and the students a couple of hours after school for homework.

Saturdays will be all day, about 9:00 or 10:00 to 5:00. Longer if we're behind.

Some Sundays, if the site is open. We also give up holidays like MLK day to work.

As ship date approaches, time may be extended later into the evenings.

Students are expected to be there as often as possible, given their other commitments. Missing a Sunday because of church is expected; missing because you just didn't feel like getting up isn't a good excuse.

If you cut out non-essentials, such as video games, tv and texting, you can concentrate on both build, homework, and your other activities. CD is the only website you need for 6 weeks. :)

Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

Team 457 build season meetings are:

Monday 3:30-8:00pm
Wensdays 3:30-8:00pm
Thursdays 3:30-8:00pm
Saturndays 9am-5pm (we stay if we need longer if we need to finish things)

Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

Team 188 meets Monday - Friday from the end of classes till about 10. As with other teams that tends to go till 11 if needed. In the last hours the janitors will allow us to stay later with conditions. We also meet Saturday 9 - 7 and Sunday 1- 10. Everyone on the team is expected to bring at least one meal for the team. Some of us that are there every night bring 2. The team also meet at lunch were eating, homework and robot build take place.

Members are encouraged to keep grades up. Help can be found in the room with students and teachers. We do not expect everyone to be there every night but attendance is looked at for going to regionals. The students sign in and out for safety and an hours spent log. If there are tie breakers for going to a regional then we look at the hours spent.

Mentors attend 98% of the time with some mentors going to special meetings (hockey) but all are back by supper. Supper is held Sunday - Friday at 6 and lunch on Saturday is at 1. I will warn that burnout will happen without constant awareness.

Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

Let's see....115 meets every day of the week. Monday through Friday is from 3:00 to 6:00. Saturday and Sunday are about 1:00 to either 5:00 or 6:00...and of course like most other teams, we begin to stay a longer towards the end of build. Since our team is fairly big compared to other teams, attendance is not mandatory as in everyday but more of like what you can handle given your workload, so basically it ends up being 3-4 days/week. :)

Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

Are there mentors there all of the time? is somebody that comes all of the time?

We work at the warehouse of a company. they have maybe 15 employees so unless we find more mentors and establish some form of agreement with them i do not think we will be working past 5/6 on weekdays. We need to talk this out with them and all of the old team members (although i wish there were more of them, we only have maybe 4 dedicated members that experienced last years build season.

Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

Yes, you need responsible adults there at all times.

One thing to consider when assigning sub-team responsibilities is the availability of the students. It doesn't do your team much good if the lead arm technical person is only available 6 hours a week - no matter how good he or she is at building an arm.

Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

Little to no sleep is inevitable. Although we're working from the school and the janitors would like to get home sometime, so we can't stay really late or sleep there. I heard that the last teacher had keys to the school, which helped a lot. Is it easier for those teams who work out of a seperate workshop/machineshop?

Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

sorry, let me rephrase that previous question: is there one or a group of mentors that is/are at every meeting to make sure that things run smoothly?

How do the parents of freshmen/rookie members usually react to the time requirements during build season?

thanks, vivek

Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

Yes, definitely. At least a coach or mentor is there whenever any student is there.

The requirements for the team are spelled out very clearly in the mandatory parents meeting (we held it last week). We do emphasize what I posted earlier though: If your teachers say you're slipping, "then out you do go". Like Alan Anderson (and others) stated, there's lots of help for homework from students, teachers and mentors.

Don

Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

To state it bluntly, we meet

Every.
Single.
Day.

Woohoo! Is it January yet? :D

Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

To truly say that we've maximized our time well and put out our best effort, our plan has always been.............EVERY DAY!
On superbowl sunday, its our shortest day since we leave to watch the game at 1:00pm Hawaii time.:D
During build season, check out our website as we update our progress daily. As of right now, we are meeting daily afterschool for several hours, except on weekends to work on prototyping, documentation, off-season event planning and the build season preparation.

Re: how often does your team meet during build season?
 

arg, i am not getting this right. I mean: is there a single mentor that shows up to every single one of the meetings? the same mentor.

I im inferring that there is usually not and that we need more than just 3.5 mentors

thanks, vivek