Re: MARS 1523 is Facing a Problem....
 

Start recruiting new students, NOW! Spring is a great time to recruit for the fall!

We were impacted this year by a large number of Seniors graduating on 2007. The team "recruited like crazy" and around 40 new students started this fall. By the time build season rolled around we still had 18 new students, all of them engaged and essential to our team.

Some of our recuriting lessons learned:

Try to get twice as many new students as you need. Once school gets rolling in the fall, many end up choosing alternate activities, especially when you clearly communicate the time requirements during build season.

Don't forget to recruit from friends of current team members.

Recruit from other special interest groups - don't overlook the need for artists, presenters, business types, etc.

Do specific activities to acclimate / assimilate new team members to make sure they feel that they belong and to make sure they know what will happen during build.

Don't forget to get their parents on the loop too!

Re: MARS 1523 is Facing a Problem....
 

he nailed it you need to get the word out and look for more students
this it a chance to really step it up a rebuild

Re: MARS 1523 is Facing a Problem....
 

Make sure your seniors teach the underclass as much as thy can before they leave!!! Have them write out things (powerpoints work well) on everything they were good at that, maybe they did better than everyone! That way you may end up being stronger if all the juniors get these messages, and they all become as strong as the seniors, thus making you team stronger!!!

I wish you guys the best of luck!! and don't forget to Recuit!!!

Re: MARS 1523 is Facing a Problem....
 

We have a packet of triumphs and stats, it won us the Chairman's Award. We already have a bunch of little sponsors and are good money savers. But one problem is that a lot of mentors have kids who are graduating, many seem very dedicated so maybe they won't leave with their kids. If MARS loses school affiliation, it'll be harder to recruit, but we'll manage. Our workspace had tons of computers with expensive Autodesk software, so our Animation crew will have difficulties if we lose our workspace. Does anyone have suggestions about dealing with a lack of computers/nessesary software?

Re: MARS 1523 is Facing a Problem....
 

One thing that we are planning on doing this summer is having a few seniors teach the students in their specialized subgroup. Our normal teaching program, MORT U. is not within the reach of the seniors leaving for college so we want to have a good start on the learning process beforehand this year. Something that we want to do this year is have each student know how to do more than just one thing really well. We believe that being on drive train or end effector should go hand in hand with being great at inventor or other CAD. Basically, you'll be surprised by how much the underclassmen can step up. Like Brandon stated before, we've had similar problems like that in the past and came out stronger from it and it looks like something similar is happening this year with around 17 of the most brilliant people I have ever known leaving from the team not to mention a mentor who is retiring from teaching. Those are all heavy hits on a team's morale and spirit, but just remember to take it in strides and still be confident in the students.

I'm not sure about it, but check Microsoft's site about software grants like free copies of Windows and stuff..its always good to check. Also, ask around if any companies, schools, or libraries are throwing out or planning on recycling old computers. If it comes down to it, just ask people around town. We always have people willing to donate computers, if not forever, they let us use them for build season and return them afterward.

Best of luck to you guys:)

Re: MARS 1523 is Facing a Problem....
 

FIRST gives out the AutoDesk software every year as part of the KOP (I think like 10 copy's of both 3ds Max and the AutoCad Suite, correct me if my # are wrong) and i bet if you ask the students they have laptops capable of running these programs they are willing to bring in. 100% of our animation and Cad this year was done on personal laptops and it worked out well (plus they can work at home with this method)

Re: MARS 1523 is Facing a Problem....
 

Talk to big companies. 330 got a bunch through Lockheed a few years ago. Often, companies will have some way of getting old functioning computers out to people that need them. You'd probably end up with a 3-year-old computer needing an operating system, but you'd be able to choose your system and it'd have enough for text, Inventor, animation, and programming. Free.

Re: MARS 1523 is Facing a Problem....
 

I am going to have to agree with Holley on this one. It seems like this is a great opportunity for the underclassmen to take the brunt of the load. We had a team of 5 people in '07 and I got to take a role that no rookie freshman on a more experienced team would take.

-Vivek

Re: MARS 1523 is Facing a Problem....
 

Just had another idea:

If you guys will be at Mission Mayhem, ask teams to come for an open discussion or help session for your team. Its better when you can talk to the teams who are close to you on a one on one basis. Ask them to bring examples of their best sponsorship letters and just ask for help. It works better when you can actually talk to more than one person at a time b/c ideas develop better that way. And who knows, maybe some other team is having the same problems?

+$0.02:]

EDIT: Here is the team list with their websites and such (Not 100% sure if that's for 2008). Try to contact some of them beforehand and ask them to bring examples of their best work for you guys. I'm sure they'd love to help.

Re: MARS 1523 is Facing a Problem....
 

You've gotten a lot of great advice for what to do to help with the current situation, but I have a suggestion to help you for the future:

Always make sure you have someone to replace your graduating members; have a senior member train an interested buddy to step into their shoes when the time comes. In the past, our team lost about 2 seniors a year, and this year, it's losing 11 (about 30% of the team). While this is a huge loss of talent, wisdom, creativity, and knowledge, the team is still prepared for next year because they will have people to replace the graduating seniors. Also, start training your freshmen early!

Good luck, I wish your team the best.