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Many teams are competing at bag and tag events this year and in the past and probably even more in the future. These bag and tag teams are guided under Gracious Professionalism to bag there robot by the rules and not open it until the rules permit. Everyone in the community allows GP to be the determining factor as to whether teams are abiding by the rules.
When a team says that they are student/mentor built no matter the percentage, GP seems to be thrown out the window for some people in FRC. They look at a well engineered good looking robot and say that a group og high school students could not have done that. And they are right it was done by a collaboration of students and Adult mentors doing what they should be doing mentoring and learning. We experienced some discrimination this year at Pittsburgh as well. We were called "rebels" by one of the Safety judges behind our backs when he found out our team was from South Carolina. Unknown to him he told a fellow volunteer from South Carolina this. (Which is how we found out) Although our incident was not as public it hurts. I hope that this does not happen again to teams like 1114. And certainly hope it was not due to them being Canadian as one of our largest sponsors headquarters is located there. And on a personal note...sorry to Karthik for not having spare banebot motors we definitely should have brought are unused KOPs however it did not seem to effect you guys in the long run. Congrats on another win. |
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**This represents my personal experience and opinions, not those of GRT 192**
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In my past experiences as a student on 192, I have noticed that the students directly involved in designing and building the robot or modeling the animation or otherwise contributing to team success in a very direct way [includes sponsorships etc] are an order of magnitude more interested and inspired by their time on the team than students who rarely contribute. One of my pet projects in leadership was finding the students on the 'outskirts' of the team and getting them involved throughout the year. Of course being a student on GRT wouldn't be nearly as much fun or nearly as inspirational without the wide mentor and parent support we enjoy. GRT's robots are 100% student built. Our high-quality workmanship is a point of pride, and our team-members have put in the hours of practice to achieve it. We also have a machine shop better than most college shops, the culmination of 15 years of unwavering dedication from our lead mentor, and a number of mentors who make sure we don't hurt ourselves and break tools while we work. This informs my opinion that a truly 100%-mentor-funded-built-and-troubleshot robot (that I doubt exists in modern FRC) is a disservice to the students on that team. As a team is more and more mentor driven I find it harder and harder to support them unconditionally. It's appropriate to have a happy medium, and I suspect many teams are closer to 'medium' than they would like to believe. On-topic: Pittsburgh's incidents are embarrassing and a darn shame. Some of my friends on a certain local team have experienced the same kind of ostracism, at last year's Nationals no less. ("How could a bunch of high school girls put together a bot that successful?" when I would love to recruit some of them for my old team.) I was shocked when I heard about it--I had no idea that kind of thing was going on, and if I see it in the future I'll try to step in. I disagree with OP's emphasis on 'professionalism', primarily for the same reason I disagree with an emphasis on 'tolerance'--tolerating something still implies that the tolerated thing is bad. Taking the 'gracious' out of 'professionalism' would solve very little, after all. ;) Unfortunately I don't have a better replacement in mind yet, making this criticism pointless (don't criticize until you have a solution, right?); I will continue to think about it (probably after Finals are over this quarter) and try to post something more constructive later. |
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I want to restate that this negativity is NOT in FIRST just about who built the robot (student, mentor, student/mentor). It exists in many other aspects of FIRST. This discussion has become about the disparity of resources between "powerhouse" and "other" teams, but that isn't what John's point is about. It's about correcting the behavior, and 1114 is just his example.
If it helps, I'll provide another example. This year in NJ, 1089 was fortunate enough to finish in the Top 8. We had been scouted by several teams, and many more stopped by our pit both to lobby for us to pick them, and some to discuss picking us. When it came time for alliance selections, we knew the higher-seeded 2180 had intentions to pick us. BUT (while we have a great relationship with them) we also knew that the best alliance for our team did not include them. Politely, my alliance captain on the field declined the offer - and got booed for it. We were lucky, however, to have Dave Lavery there doing alliance selections over the mic. He quickly explained that it was completely within our rights to choose to decline for any number of reasons, hushed the teams, then announced us as the #6 seed, citing "Well, now we know why they declined." My student was already upset about having to decline 2180, and when he left the field with our alliance, he was clearly bothered by the crowd's reaction. It wasn't the only incident we experienced in NJ this year, and we are certainly not a powerhouse team (yet). Several students on another team were accusing our team of "not deserving to be there" and "not building a good enough robot to be where we were seeded." Now, this didn't happen directly to our faces, but just a few rows behind us. The problem WAS addressed by the mentors on that team, and for that I thank them. What I want to stress is that this can happen to ANY team in FIRST, and it shouldn't. |
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And now that I've replied to every post in this thread... John, I have had numerous talks with Karthik about this topic and the utter disrespect that powerhouses get from students who just don't get it. I have also come to the conclusion that it just isn't these students' fault. FIRST is such an alien concept to anyone outside of it and unless someone teaches them that you don't want to BEAT 1114 you want to BE 1114 they will never know. I don't blame students for bad attitudes, I blame mentors who don't discourage them. I will admit that I am not exactly a ray of sunshine all the time but I will say that I tried my best to remind my students that this is about inspiration and we should celebrate excellence instead of shunning it. |
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I posted this as a comment on the "haters" article, but I thought it would be better spread on CD
I agree with most of what you said, however your striving for excellence being equated to a desire to win seemed a little off to me when you later commented on how your team is founded on the learning/growing experience and fueled by student commitment (which I whole-heartedly support). I came across this post from your culture change article which I completely agree with, however, I believe a lot of the problems you described arose out of the competition centered mentality that FIRST currently employs, something I gleaned from this post of yours. Within FIRST, as a competition, I would say it's hard to disagree that teams with more members/resources/mentors do have an upper-hand; this being said however, in the aspect of FIRST that I believe should be the predominant focus, building the best robot you can while learning and growing as much as possible along the way, members/resources/mentors really don't have any influence, it really does all boil down to the student's eagerness to learn and commitment to the program. Because of this, when I read that your team members are actively involved with your mentors and do put in the time, I am overjoyed, and your feats of engineering really are stunning each year, however, when I read that you are fueled out of a desire to win, especially right after reading your culture change article, I can't help but be a little disappointed . So maybe instead of your goal being a "winning robot" maybe it should be "the best robot we could build" with the "winning" part being an indication or reward that follows because of this goal being employed. Note that I agree/support everything else you wrote about |
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I could never decline and offer because there was better teams! That is amazing that you would do that! |
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Why do we celebrate mediocrity as a culture? Why do we look down on people who have competitive drive? FIRST is a lot of things, but at it's heart it is a robotics competition. When we are at a competition we're there to win. There's a lot of other great things we get out of the actual competition like meeting other teams, learning about other teams robots, etc, but it IS a competition and if you aren't there to compete and try to win, why bother? A desire to be the best you can at everything you do should be what all teams strive to teach their students, in my not so humble opinion. |
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Let me reiterate. It's not about the competition. FIRST is simply about spreading interest in science and technology . the competition is a byproduct, one of many tools employed by the organization. But competition is not at the heart. If a team builds a robot to field, even builds a robot that won't move, they've all won, because they are all taking part in the solution. If a group is working to inspire students to go into science and technology, then how they do in the competition is dust in the wind, because it's the building and long hours to accomplish a collective goal that are going to stick with them, not the scores of their 3rd qualifying match at FLR. Also, how can you imply that if a team isn't winning, they are mediocre? any person involved in building a FIRST robot is far from mediocre. The advanced systems, design techniques, teamwork etc. is far from what society would consider mediocre. That being said, I'd love to win. Anybody would. But in the long run, winning and losing are the same thing. At the end of the day, every team in FRC has accomplished something amazing in the sculpting of the next generation of leaders. |
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I never said that the whole point of our team is to win. Those are two totally different things. |
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On that note, we are still at a competition and should not settle for anything other than our best. Just because a team wants to win a regional or see themselves on Einstein doesnt mean that they have missed the true message of FIRST. |
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I see that this discussion has drifted to become another "mentor built vs. student built" thread. I'm sure that this is not what John was talking about.
I believe that at the heart of the matter is what FIRST is about. Inspiration. Sometimes people are inspired by that which is incredible. Other times they are discouraged. Once I saw 148's video, I must admit that my first reaction (after "WOW!!) was "how can we compete against that?" And then came the questions: "how did you...?" "Is that a....?" And then cam the answers. Detailed answers. Things that I started saying "humm... we can try to do that next year". (And my regard and respect for people like JVN continued to go up.) I was being inspired. But getting over that hurdle can be difficult if you focus on the competition. This may be part of what some people these so-called "haters" are feeling sore about. There is a clear if indeed fine line between mentors who make their program about winning a robotics competition and mentors who make their program about inspiring and changing the lives of their team members and others. The fact that the latter can be accomplished by making it seem that you are doing the former is one of the great things about competitive robotics. It is why many of us keep doing what we do. I will once again put the idea out there. If you are part of one of the teams that others "hate on" then YOU go out and change their mind. It might be a greater challenge than building a blue-banner robot, but it can be just as rewarding - perhaps even more so. -Mr. Van Coach, Robodox |
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Fantastic post John.
I think that something we should try to do with our students is not ignore this thread by simply saying "this isn't my team, we would never do that" and moving on, but rather, print up a copy of JVN's post and show it to your students and discuss not only proper behavior, but TEACH them how respond to people booing and talking poorly to people around them in a positive manner. I will be discussing proper behavior with my FLL kids tomorrow night and hope that the rest of the FIRST community goes over it as well. |
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It was one of those Holy Cow moments. Jane |
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NJ when 1089 declined an alliance I heard boo's. That pissed me off quite a bit because people think it is supposed to be insulting or something if you decline.
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I took the crowd's reaction as just shock of "oohs", but it was my student (and a few others) who came off the field and said he heard booing as well. And thank you for the compliment. Our scouting team and head coach had a long discussion before we sent our alliance captain down to the field. We debated what the right decision was, because we didn't want to burn any bridges. It came down to a matter of trust. I trusted my scouters and the data they collected, they trusted my judgment, and our coach trusted the team to make the decision that was right for this year's machine. Ultimately, we believed we could build a stronger alliance as a captain, and we had a great run with 1647 and 102 in elims. 2180 is a great team, and we certainly look forward to working with them in the long run. And no, their team was not part of the crowd that chastised my captain. [/end tangent] |
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I just want to say that this is an amazing thread, and should probably be stickied. Actually, on second thought, if it gets stickied, then noone will read it, so don't.
Regardless, there are immature people in this world, and unfortunately there are some who choose to join FIRST teams. What astounds me, is that I noticed nothing of these goings on at FLR. Or in fact, were there any mentioned beyond NJ and WPI regionals. Everyone should remember just how good every single other regional was, because they were. |
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Competition doesn't mean rudeness, though. I certainly don't see that mentioned anywhere! |
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The goal isn't to keep the "bad" kids out. The goal is to take the "bad" out of kids, thereby transforming OUR culture. |
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FIRST existed before its competitions did. And it will continue to exist after they end. To say that competition is at the center of FIRST is to completely overlook all of the other things they do to inspire students.
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So back to the topic...
Can we change the culture within FIRST to where it is no longer okay to make mean remarks about a team on YouTube just because you're jealous of them? How can we teach teams to use their jealousy to raise the bar instead of try to lower the ceiling? How do we instill a culture of professionalism? |
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I might not be adding much to this thread, but I want to add my support for 1114 and all they do.
When I started my FIRST experience back in 2004 and 2005 I heard the same voices that criticized 1114. I quickly got to know the students and mentors involved in 1114 and figured out no its not that they are doing anything the wrong way, its just that they work harder and are more professional then we are. That was really my turning point in FIRST, thats when I figured it out, 1114 has inspired me throughout the years to build better robots, and build a better team. I've got to know alot of the people involved in 1114, and once you get to know them you wonder how can anyone hate this group of people? I've known for years that 1114 has haters, I've heard the haters complaining about them year after year at GTR. This year I hope the FIRST community will help us take a stand against the negativity thrown their way (and the way of other powerhouse teams), and appreciate how much we can learn and be inspired by them. |
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Thank you, -Luke |
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It is about celebrating one of the few professions that CREATE value rather than just shuffling it around. This event isn't about who wins or who loses, it isn't about who built or designed whatever. This is about showing students what a real engineer does because most of them, as strange as this may seem to us, have never met one. If you still think that student run teams are better there isn't much more I can do to tell you how wrong you are other than say that FIRST has had this issue for at LEAST the 8 yrs I've been in FRC and done nothing about it. Give it up, every team is run differently, stop saying your way is better than any other way. |
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JVN,
I also have witnessed the lack of professionalism. To keep things simple at a regional competition i witnessed a strategy aimed at disloging a minibot by ramming from a host robot. I have no problem with this strategy, however the teams conduct afterwards was where they to me lost their professionalism. After the minibot was dislogged the they started moving as if they were to continue blocking, but decided that a G48 was in order. They then stopped their defence and started scoring. Thankfully the team was able to partially mend the minibot from what i could tell, but the incident affected deployment of that minibot for the rest of the competition. This is hypocracy because the team had freshly started a Gracious Professionalism Campaign. I am truely sorry that 1114 had to suffer what it did. I guess there are those who can not handle the pressures of FIRST in a productive way. I personally can not wait till more video is up of the beautiful robots produced in Team IFI. Qwertyu8 |
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The first thing Mr Amir said to me when I went up to him to ask him about their autonomy was that the robot was coded by his students. I said to myself in my head, "how many times does this man get accused of doing everything that he has to say that out of impulse?" I am a very analytical guy and I catch on subtle things such as those. Sure I never said that I did not believe that his students did not program it, I merely just asked how they did it, whether it was line trackers or some other way.
I know how it feels to get hated upon. During our rival game, I went to the rival's side of the stands and I over heard the people saying that they lost because our team was half Juniors. I personally was ticked off by that statement. First because I was a Junior on JV, and the other thing was that people tend to find an excuse or a scapegoat for their failures. I can say that all you can do is blame yourself. |
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But how? Well, we could respond to every post/comment with a "You don't know the team, please withhold this type of judgment until you do" or some similar device. But that can also make us look bad. Could we simply ignore actions and comments like that? NO. We cannot afford to. If ignored, they will get worse. Sometimes it might work--but only if the person is a troll looking for a response. What we can do is to respond appropriately to actions and comments of that form: Invite those making those comments to join us for a while, or ask if we can work with them for a time--the remainder of the event, or a build week(end), or as long as they like, as long as necessary or until one or both decide that differences are irreconcilable. Maybe even trade a few members for a short time, or arrange for the experience to happen with another similar "powerhouse" team. Fight fire with water, if you will. This works especially well if the team making the invitation is the team that has been accused/badmouthed, etc., but may also work for a similar-level team. If a team opts to accept that offer, ideally both teams benefit. One more team wants to be like the powerhouse, which keeps the powerhouse innovating and the level of competition climbing. One more team "gets it". Two teams become friends. Ideas are exchanged. Teams are exposed to some of the inner workings of other teams. If a team opts to decline the offer, OTOH, then that's their choice. There isn't a limit to how many times the offer can be extended. All teams should be reminded of <G60>: Be civil while in the arena. You can't be penalized for off-field actions in a match, but you can be held accountable by field personnel. (paraphrased) I would also say that other teams may help said field personnel in some cases. I'm not going to suggest any methods, but there are a few that could be employed, most of them less than gracious and/or taking way too long to implement (i.e. multiple years instead of weeks/months/one year). |
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While I'm not particularly fond of the idea of a so called "mentorbot", I understand that team circumstances may warrant the move.
What I frown upon specifically is a team who moves to a "mentorbot" and completely tune out the students involved, and just hand them a "perfect" robot. I don't like the notion, and I would advise any team not to do so. However, I was reminded by my driver, participating in FIRST as far back as '02 (I was our coach this year) that those circumstances are not a reason to bash a team. I realized several days after our competition, although I did so only in private conversations, I did bash a team I believed of doing that. I realized that that is no reason to do that, especially in FIRST. I know I will take that experience with me through the rest of life, and definitely in my future professional (TM JVN) communications to keep that in mind. Only JVN could say what he said so elegantly. Thanks for blowing the whistle good sir. |
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Although I don't think it applies, the metaphor of athletics is constantly applied to FRC.
So I'll go with that. If an athlete is very talented/skilled/athletic, people instantly assume that athlete is on steroids/HGH/blood doping. This is so pervasive, it goes outside the traditional popular sports into auto racing, bicycling, even horses and dogs. It doesn't stop at professional sports - think of the East German women swimmers or Chinese gymnasts at their respective Olympic games. Robots don't have steroids. Thorough inspections certify that. The fallback kneejerk reaction is Adults. It has been ingrained in us all that every great drama must have a villain. "You're either with us or you're against us." "If you're with us, then you're against them." "If you like A, then you must hate B." Sports are built around rivalries - Packers vs. Vikes, Sox vs. Yanks, Buckeyes vs. Wolverines. To be a fan of your team, you must hate the opponents. It is critical to our continued growth and success to recognize, and to make others realize, THERE ARE NO OPPONENTS. In the qualifications, alliance partners are (sort of) random. In the eliminations, there are only the good and the other good. We're all part of the same team - it's sometimes called Team Kamen, sometimes called Team Flowers. |
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FIRST Employees and Officials must demand it of themselves and of each other. Volunteers must demand it of themselves and of each other. Mentors must demand it of themselves and of each other. Everyone needs to keep each other in line....we are all adults and we should expect respect, no matter the circumstance. And then Mentors must instill this culture of professionalism in their students. This will not be easy for all students to accept, but that's part of being a mentor. We aren't here to just teach them how to build robots or write essays and give presentations. We aren't here to just be buddies with our students. We aren't here to make sure that they're having a great time all of the time. Our role is not strictly of "coach"...we are Mentors. Our students watch us, on and off the playing field, in and our of the shop, to see how we interact with other people. It is our job, as Mentors, to enforce a positive attitude, to encourage the respect of other teams and members of those teams, and to live that respect ourselves. It also helps to talk about it. Talk about attitudes in your team meetings, talk about how to handle it if someone is lashing out at you or your team. And talk about how negative attitudes towards other teams are not acceptable. I've been thinking a lot about the Culture of FIRST. Within that Culture, there are a lot of different kinds of sub-cultures, depending on team's philosophies and values. These sub-cultures may not always align with each other, and they may not also have all of the same goals, but that's part of the beauty of FIRST: it mirrors how the real world is. Not all successful businesses have the same values or goals either, but they learn from each other through their interactions. Understand that teams are all different from each other. Respect and learn from these differences, whether you agree with them or not. Do the best that you can on your own team with a good attitude: that is as inspirational as a robot that goes undefeated all season long. |
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It's certainly something that must be dealt with. It will require people to speak up and make somewhat awkward situations in times they may usually do or say nothing. Despite all of this, human nature will still run rampant. The nature to say "wow, our robot was not competitive, it must be because those other teams cheated." This kind of attitude will be very difficult to deal with because for most teams its never stated publicly or even out loud to other team members. This is where we must emphasize that powerhouse teams need to be celebrated and not persecuted. Like I said, it will have to be on an individual basis, we're all responsible for shifting the culture. -Brando |
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In every reveal video I've seen this year, there has been a collage of still photos of people working on designs or parts or assemblies. I would estimate that in less than 4% of these pictures, a non-pre-college-student is the one holding the tools. The evidence is out there, people just choose to ignore it to suit their conspiracy fantasies. Given, JVN does blog a lot about himself spending a lot of time in front of his CAD machine, but I don't recall him ever saying he was alone, or the designs were solely by him. I rather got the feeling he was working with students, improving upon their ideas. |
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I haven't read through the whole thread yet, but I was a volunteer on the field every day at the Pittsburgh regional and wanted to put in my input.
First, congratulations to 1114, 1503 and 3492. You guys were great! I was a first hand witness to one of these types of incidents regarding 1114. So, these types of things do happen. The incident I witnessed involved tempers flaring after a team was eliminated. We have all been there. In the heat of the moment and we let our emotions get the best of us. It is a very tough challenge to try and change the culture so much that tempers will not get the best of teams. However, I believe this change is necessary. It needs to start with the mentors of the team and filter down to the students. The culture of coopertition and gracious professionalism needs to be preached and practiced by the teams early and often. This is a huge undertaking and I don't think it will be solved by 1 CD thread. Every once in a while it pops up, not much happens, and then it goes back to the same-old, same-old. I don't know yet what this action needs to be, but I think we should have a conversation where we talk about possible solutions and how to actually get them done. I also want to mention that I don't think Pittsburgh specifically should get a bad wrap from this. This was the first time I had ever been to the regional and the overall reception and attitude of most people was great. It was a super fun regional. However, there were definitely things said and done by people that should never happen and are totally unacceptable. In all the situations, it seemed like the bad comments and actions did not represent the whole team, but a small group of students inside that team. I have also been to many other regionals and the problem seems to be widespread. |
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John--I don't know if you really understand how things look from the other end. Maybe you do, or maybe you did at one time, but forgot.
I read Neal's book "The New Cool". 2009 was a great year for the our team the NERDS, we had a lot of seniors who were very enthusiastic, and we built a pretty good working and looking robot, mostly out of plywood and plastic pipe (it even sported a couple pieces of wood 2x4). Reading Neal's book brought back the whole thing, our robot was similar to 1717's design, and we played against them in Los Angeles. They went on to dominate at the Davis regional, we went on to dominate at the Arizona regional. We both went to Championships, where we got lost in the shuffle and they lost to an unstoppable powerhouse alliance at the division level. While reading the book, it occurred to me that our team put in maybe half as much effective effort as 1717 that year. From what I've seen of how some of the "powerhouse" teams operate, my guess is that 1717 put in about one quarter to one half as much effective effort as those teams. Yet we blew away the field at Arizona that year. With 1/4 to 1/8th as much as it takes to be a powerhouse. Where does that put the majority of teams? The powerhouse teams not just incrementally "better" than most teams. This is an exponential phenomenon. The teams that look at your robot don't think to themselves "if we worked a little harder, we could do that!". They think "Gosh golly, those guys have magic!" I called it "effective effort", and that's really what it is. There's some combination of brainpower, enthusiasm, experience, energy, and who knows what, that makes a powerhouse team. It's magic. Sure, all the other teams can get there....just like anyone can win the lottery. We're human, we have emotions, and one of them is jealousy. When the chasm between what one team can do and what another can do is so great, there are bound to be resentments. How we deal with these emotions is something we can control, and we have to control. Thanks for bringing this issue up in public where we can talk about how to deal with it. |
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Zero Tolerance – Organizational policy stating unacceptable behavior will not be tolerated. Clearly define the unacceptable behaviors AND define punishments for not following. Record and document each and every infraction. Make the punishment have teeth; I suggest individual and/or team exclusion from events for repeat documented offenses. Could include escalation scale and should include mediation framework to arbitrate inevitable he said/she said. Systemic Training – Starting with kickoff and repeated at each event. Clearly communicate zero tolerance policy and what to do when it occurs; Suggest mandatory incident reporting (ie. if you see it report it). This helps offset the “guilt” associated with reporting since it is required and if there are umpteen reports of an incident you can bet it happened. Vocal Majority – Stated many times already in this thread: Stand Up and Speak Up. Grab a handful of well respected mentors across teams and confront bad behavior. Most of all model good behavior and be proactive about recognizing good behavior from other teams. More Social Socials – Get to know each other better. Suggest having socials on Thursday night before the competition. Do not use the “party” framework. Intentionally mix up team member and force them to learn and participate in games cross-team. It is harder to hate someone when you know them by name. Proactive Graciousness – If you lose go tell each team on the opposing alliance “good job”. If you win go tell each team on the opposing alliance “good job”. In sports we shake hands after we compete win or lose, should be the same after each match. Eliminate Anonymity – Also stated in this thread. Personal restraint is loosened when they think they won’t be caught. Establish positive credentials system to ensure that what is said publically on forums such as this can be attributed. I don't believe morality can be legislated so these actions will never fully solve the problem; however, the focused approach should help minimize the offenses. |
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Having read all ten pages of this thread, there is something that I fell still needs to be added to the conversation.
While I have never had the honor of sharing the field with 1114 and many of the other "power teams" mentioned, and I admittedly hold a Yankee type jealousy towards them, I have shared the field with certain Nationally known and recognized teams and left the field feeling quite offended, my respect for that team gone. This team had an adult mentor as their drive coach, who took control of the decisions from the get go. He would not listen to our teams input, for it was his way or the highway. The lack of respect he showed for Me as a student, my fellow students, and the students on the third team was completely appalling, and to me, reflected on the rest of his team. At another competition, a mentor from the same team was waiting with our team in the queing area, waiting for our match together to begin. At this time we were having problems with our drivetrain, and another student and I had our hands in the robot fixing it. This mentor came over, proclaimed that we were going about fixing it the wrong way, and threw his hands into our robot to begin to do it his way. I quickly, and probably rather rudely responded to him that us students could fix our own teams robot, and we didn't need his help. I guess the moral of the story is that sometimes these hard feelings do have a base to support them. While booing a team and making remarks about them is completely unacceptable, I feel that maybe some teams/mentors also dont realize that their actions have contributed to their "reputation." Don't take this as criticism towards 1114, who for all I hear, and can tell,not only make awesome robots, but foster the kind of team that FIRST dreams about. But just as there are bad apples that boo them, there are bad apple "power teams" that lend to that reputation. |
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As has been suggested many times in this thread already, most of FIRST does not read CD. I challenge everyone reading this to stand up at their next team meeting and remind the team - students, mentors and parents - of what is acceptable behavior and what is not. And if they witness such behaviors, reprimand the bad behaviors and acknowledge the good behavior. FIRST is not talk radio or what passes for "commentary" on TV, where you are encouraged to belittle and abuse anyone who acts or thinks differently than you. FIRST celebrates differences.
Spread the word. If you don't have your own, and are at a event with MOE, ask for one of our GP or Grandmother buttons. http://moe365.org/spirit.php |
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Some other options I came up with: --Judges blocking teams out of awards, no matter if they should get it or not--would probably work best if a note was sent to the team after the event explaining the reason --Teams not allying with that team in eliminations, no matter how good their robot was, by decline if necessary --Calling the team out publicly --"Return the favor"; that is, do the same thing to them that they're doing to you/other team at the event How many of those options would actually work? How many would take longer than a year? How many would create really bad feelings? Again, for those reading this thread, remember <G60>. Remember the real meaning of Gracious Professionalism. |
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In NO other circumstance would the victim of an attack be expected to explain to others why the attack on them was unjust. This should be no different. These teams should not be asked to do anything more than they already do -- especially as an attempt to get others to stop mistreating them.
If we want more people to value these teams, then those of us that already value them need to step up, speak out and defend them when people act and behave like jerks. We shouldn't expect the teams being insulted to do it alone, we shouldn't expect the event organizers to do it on our behalf and we shouldn't expect FIRST to do it on any level. Peer pressure works. Use it for a good reason and you can make a lot of good happen. |
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It's not a team action that needs to occur, its actions needed to be taken on individual basis for anyone involved in FIRST. -Brando |
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For an organization that was founded on the idea that the dominant cultural belief that athletics is valuable and engineering is "nerdy" and "uncool," the FIRST community tends to react badly to criticism of its methods and norms. Why shouldn't people argue that student run teams are better tools for accomplishing the aims of the organization? Why enforce the same static cultural rigidity that gets established in virtually any society, when the whole founding idea of FIRST was to be radical -- to envision a different sort of world? When the CD community dogpiles on a dissenter, that's what they are doing -- rushing to the ramparts to drive off barbarians who don't accept the dominant view of the world. And that's just as bad as what FIRSTers believe the mainstream culture is doing. I could go on and give examples from political history of revolutionaries and radicals who more-or-less instantly became reactionaries and conservatives once they took power, but I'm pretty sure you all get that without me pointing it out. I encourage you all not to turn from FIRST radicals into complacent majorities who favor dogma over change and unity over finding the best possible ideas. If you can't defend your beliefs without simply shouting down others who disagree, perhaps your beliefs don't have much value in the first place. How does this tie into the thread? Simply bashing the organizations that are the most successful in FRC they way it exists today is stupid. If you believe that the system has produced some methods that produce dysfunctional results, it is incumbent upon you to come up with rational arguments showing that those methods aren't the best possible, and, if you can, suggest changes to make the program better. Those who defend the status quo ante are then obligated to present their argument. If you avoid this discussion because, "FIRST has always done it this way and won't ever change," that's bad for everyone, both the defenders of the current methods and those who seek change. "Because I said so" doesn't advance anything, doesn't improve learning, and certainly isn't going to "change the culture." If you believe that the folks who run FIRST won't ever change and don't listen to thoughtful criticism, it might be best to just not talk about things any more. There does come a time where you have to stop talking and take action. (I'm not talking armed rebellion or revolution here. Just to be sure you don't misunderstand.) That action might be to find another similar organization that shares your values, or you might want to start your own program. I'm not making the argument that FIRST is like this, but if you believe that nothing you say is ever listened to you should start to listen to that "give it up" advice . If it hurts when you hit yourself in the head, eventually you might want to drop the hammer and find something else to do. And don't call people names just because they are better at optimizing a solution under the given constraints. It's foolish and dishonest. |
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It's frustrating to know that one's best isn't good enough. Lashing out is the common human thing to do. THAT is what has to change as a culture; FIRST seems to attempt change in this aspect of culture by nurturing failure of the mind in learning environment. Yet this frustration in failure applies to failed relationships, failed projects, failed products, failed companies, and practically everything else; FIRST is no different. It takes maturity to push through the failure, and it takes resilience to be on the receiving end of it. If we call out every knucklehead who bashed some other team publicly or privately, we could be here all day. The important thing is that 1114 has students and mentors who are resilient and (mostly) humble; that is the model we can all emulate.
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Wow! We attended Pittsburgh and were defeated in the Semis by Simbotics. I congratulated them, they outscored us. We were pitted accross from them. We chatted the whole weekend. I got to know a couple of the mentors more as we tried to adapt their minibot on to our machine. We spent hours to no avail and even after breaking one of their minibots, they were still awesome and willing to help us. I can honestly say I did not witness any of these actions and if I had I would have said something to them.
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Powerhouse teams that lawyer the rules, argue with refs and challenge inspectors will be seen as trying to "cheat" - even if they are right. Teams that have 4 students and 5 mentors in the pit on Thursday, working furiously and then have 40 students parading down to accept an award on Friday will be seen as "mentor built" - even if they are not. These teams that have drive coaches who do not listen to other drive coaches from their alliance partners will be seen as arrogant - even if they have the correct strategy. Teams that only socialize with other "winning" teams will seem elitist - even if they are simply building on long-standing friendships. This is what I meant by these teams being on a pedestal. They are celebrities. They are the rock stars. And they have the best opportunity to make a difference on this issue. Continue to act graciously and professionally and invite the "haters" into your fold. Eric is correct - fight fire with water. This is about who you are, not about who they are. It may not be "right", and indeed, you shouldn't "have to", but I agree with Eric - it is probably the fastest and most effective way to directly change the culture. Far better than rules or awards and the like. Get them to mutter "they can't possibly be teenagers... they are so gracious and so professional!" -Mr. Van Coach, Robodox |
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I don't understand how this kind of behavior can still exist in FIRST. After 20 years of enforcing the ideals of GP, I would have thought this kind of behavior would be done.
1114 is a great team. I've had the honor of working with them in past years, as well as meeting one of their mentors, Karthik, however briefly it was. No one deserves to be treated the way they were. That kind of behavior in FiRST is simply not tolerated. And John is right, I hope any teams reading these posts or his blog feel horrible about their behavior. Any way you look at it, every student and mentor on that team dedicated 6+ weeks of their lives to do what we do here. They deserve the same respect shown to other teams, volunteers, referees or judges. |
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Unacceptable... people that heckle and boo for other's achievements realize that they can't move any further to fairly compete. They do not need to publicly announce that. Team 1114 has my sympathy, no team deserves marring to their hard work.
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-John |
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I had our drive team get scouting data from the top seeded team, just before alliance selection.
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Its helps that this year has been a prime example for students how hard work can pay off. |
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I shifted the culture of one team member who seemed convinced a certain team does nothing for themselves (as in, not even their mentors). I argued, to no avail, with one graduated FIRSTer, who was convinced a team that has won a CCA (and I'm not talking pre-2000; a fairly recent HoF member) doesn't know, or has at least lost sight of, the ideals of FIRST. Despite evidence to the contrary. Not sure what to do there. I cheered for the most deserving team when they won, because they earned it. I took some sweet pictures of sweet robots, but I guess that's unrelated. But for the record, some teams are just plain inspiring. Edit: Reporting has no effect. When those who act inappropriately, mentors or students or whoever else, aren't corrected, action needs to be taken, and that is the suggestion of this thread. Most mentors share the right message with students, but it is the vocal minority that are the source of these issues. |
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PLEASE
End this thread. It went from reporting inappropriate actions to labeling people "Haters". "Haters?" You mean the people we mentor? The young men and women in their TEENS we are trying to inspire? There are many inappropriate actions that are successfully handled by mentors and these incidents are never brought up again. What happened to 1114 is regrettable and indefensible but to label those teams, students, (mentors) who boo'd as "Haters" is over the pale. The powerhouse teams are NOT victims. The people who rival them are NOT Haters and if there is that much sensitivity, then frankly there needs to be introspection. It's NOT about the robots... It's NOT about winning... it's about inspiration. And there is no greater inspiration than a mentor instructing their team..or even another team, on the appropriate way to handle their disappointment. It's a bitter pill to swallow...simply because it is...someone with greater resources bested you... did a better job... or simply lucked out... but you applaud the winners because it is right. Steve |
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At first, we hear about in first such as how one day it will be a first student to end world poverty, provide clean water to the world, and cure cancer. This implies that lift is not fair and that it is our job to help make it fair by helping others. You know what is not fair, having mentors design and build robots while kids get "inspired." Although some call it fair, most of society would call it unfair. Not to compare something as trivial as how well your team's robot does to world wide issues, but you do as well as you do in first many times because of simply what school you go to. I don't know why people want to silence public discourse on the matter. Yeah, what happened to simbotics sucks and should never happen, but is it that hard to believe? I'll be the first person to admit that I dislike the idea of mentors fully designing and cading robots and having those mentors/ a shop put it together. I instantly shot down the idea of having that happen to the team that I started and mentor. I couldn't/still can't see how students could have fun and take pride in their robot if they weren't the ones putting in the work for build design and debugging. I simply cannot see how a student can be inspired when they havent made extensive contributions to their machine. I think inspiration comes from the students seeing what they built and seeing it run and run well, Not seeing an engineer built robot dominate a bunch of other teams. At that point it isn't a high school robotics competition. Forgive me if you disagree with me and forgive me if thus doesn't make too much sense for I have been up late catching up on school work. |
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This year was the first year our team's made it to the championships. When we won on the field, our arm operator, a freshman, excitedly told the coach, driver, and analyst (all upperclassmen, myself included) "I'm so excited I'll be so close to the field when we get crushed by the powerhouse teams. I can't wait for St. Louis!"
We had showed the videos of 118, 148, and 254 to the team for inspiration the two weeks before the competition. It felt great knowing that, even if not our team in particular, FIRST was inspiring students. |
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OK I have sat by and kept silent on this thread long enough. I very wise man told me long ago that if you spread an untruth or a statement not based on fact long enough that people will believe it as fact.
Please, if you are going to make statements like, "these powerhouse teams that have the mentors build the robot ...." make sure you have the facts to back it up. You may not call teams out by name, but we all know who you are addressing. So, to spread some facts: Team 217 has 44 students and about 10 mentors (including the teachers). 12 of these students were on the design team along with me and three engineers from FANUC Robotics. The FANUC engineers were mostly there during the week while I was in Texas to answer SolidWorks questions, etc. The students are trained by a SolidWorks professional for 1 week and are trained by me for one day on how to do sheet metal the IFI way. I design certain parts of the robot and the students design others. In most cases I design less than 40% of the robot, but check 100% of the students work. My challenge to other "mentor built" teams: please share your facts ... all of them. In short, if you don't have facts, please stop making assumptions. One last thing, if you ever run into a 217 student from 2004 and earlier ask them what our team was like back then. I had the pleasure of running into a former student leader from 2003 and 2004 and her comments about how far our team has come since then really hit home with me ... thanks Jacqui! Thanks, Paul |
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Only 1 time has someone openly told me they thought that our robot was "mentor built". That team's machines were built by professional craftsmen due to sponsor and shop space rules, and they assumed we operated the same way. Ironically I always assumed that particular robot was nearly 100% student built (this is after competing with and against them for 4+ years). We don't get the public comments like a lot of the big teams, but I think that is because we go to events where there are often better teams to take the brunt of those comments.
On our team, what the students to vs. what the mentors do varies from year to year depending on the skills and interest of the students. We strive for the kids to build as much as possible. We often hit around 90% if you did a raw part count. Our school is a college prep school where the kids often have never "gotten their hands dirty". We place a high priority them getting this experience. Who does the specialty skills changes a lot. These are the skills that require some amount of talent, and a lot of practice. Every year around 10 students say they want to weld next year in the post season interveiw. Every year around 6-8 will make it through the 2 hours of "IKE's introduction to welding". Most don't go beyond that. I think the biggest problem is the hours of isolation from the team while perfecting the craft. Every few years, we will get a student that has the determination and talent to weld. I am very excited as we brought on board a new mentor with welding skills, so hopefully there is more instructional time available in the future. During the design strategy phase, we engage the entire team. After strategy, we will break into smaller groups for particular subsystems. These are usually a mentor or 2 and 4-8 kids. We brainstorm all the different ways we could do something and then prototype the ideas we like best. We also present these ideas back to the larger group to get the groups insights and critiques. During the design phase, we teach how to do engineering estiamtes for forces, dimensions, motor selection, and gear ratios. I help with which equations to use, and then make the kids do the math. They generally hate it initially, but become fond of it really quickly. We also do the math for scoring, game strategy, and tournament strategy. Almost every team member was present and participating when we analyzed the value of the Double-Ubertube manuever. This was essential so that everyone understood their role in making that auto-mode possible. The gripper, chassis, elevator, arm, and even minobot team (CG effects on auto) needed to have a vested interest in making that successful. The last couple of years, we have used a few more CNC or Waterjet parts for things that in the past have resulted in a lot of scrapped parts. We have giant bins full of brackets with 4 motor mount holes in them. Typically there is 1 on size, 1 slightly larger, one that appears to be hand-drill slotted, and one that is indescrible. This has been very valuable as it makes having an actual dimensioned design more important which makes repeatability for a practice machine more likely. It has also saved a few days of precious build time. If you take away anything from this post, please note the use of WE. I did a lot of projects when I was a kid where adult input was not legal. While you learn a lot of "what not to do", you frequently do not learn a "right way" of doing things. More often than not, you learned ways of getting the wrong way to work. I wish I had a mentor to explain why 15 lbs of thrust really wasn't sufficient for a 3lb rocket. Yes, they were beautiful, and they would go up... just not far enough for a successful parachute deployment. When "mentor input" is illegal, it also makes any mentor input significantly more valuable. In FSAE, they are not allowed to sue "ringers" yet they are allowed to have a professor in charge. Guess which teams often do the best year after year? FIRST is really cool that you get to legally work with the students in stead of working for them, or them working for you. I may be their mentor, but I am also their teammate. P.S. I was also a "hater" when I was younger of big resource (farmers, horse & pony members, sports teams, supermileage teams, solarcar teams...). Luckily my first year on Team 33 (2005), I had Jim Zondag and Tim Grogan set me straight when I made a disparranging remark about Team 67. They taught me to try to befriend and learn from everyone. I was very fortunate to have mentors like that set me straight early on. |
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The amount of time the mentors spend working on the robot depends of the make up of the team. I have recruited several teams in Louisiana that the majority of the students have never picked up a hand or power tool. They have never met an engineer and have never seen a robot. Out of a team of twenty students you may have two that feel comfortable using tools. These are the teams that need the most support. They are also the teams that need the most encouragement and guidance. Hopefully by the end of the build season you have core of students that can help in the repair. When you take a group of students that have never been involved in any kind of design project and try to introduce them to the First competition it requires a special kind of mentor. We try to get the students involved in the design of the robot but a firm direction is needed to keep the team focused. You want the teams to be able to compete and have some kind of offense capability. The first year is the hardest. I try to introduce all the schools that I can to the First program. I try to get them the engineers that they need to help build the robot. I try to get them the money they need to supplement any grants they have received. I have been fortunate in the fact that I have recruited several very good mentors and engineers to help the Lousisana schools. I does bother me to see only mentors working on the robots in the pit. Some times it can’t be helped. What really bothers me is to see mentors working on the robots and there is no student around to watch and learn.
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It's the easy way out to hate on organizations like the Yankees or the Redwings or the Patriots. It’s a much harder thing to put in the work and build an organization that is capable of being contenders year after year after year.
To get away from the Sports if you go back and read this thread the "Power House" teams weren’t born into it. They built what they have overtime, I was a ThunderChicken in 2002 when we took a chance on a Crazy Transmission that required a can of circuit chiller after every match so we didn't melt the copper in the motors (my bad on the Ozone layer) Then in 2003 our strategy was right on for the first 15 seconds and then we ran out of a plan, but from all this our team learned our organization evolved we took a look at teams that were winning Hammond, Wildstang, Bomb Squad and asked them what they did. Was there Jealousy back then? Yup, a "man I wish we could just go out and dictate the match, I wish our robot worked every match. Their mentors obviously finished work on the mars probe with enough time to design that whole robot…." Teenagers take allot at face value and even with Google still don’t find out all the facts. It’s part of being young and impressionable…mentors ;) The team I mentor now is a third year who looks at the "power house" teams as targets. How do they recruit? How do they do their fund raising? How are they structured? How do we get them to pick us? How do we beat them? How do we beat them next year? What do we have to do now to lock up Chairman’s in 2015? There allot of questions and ~2000 answers to each one, as each team dose their own thing. The really cool thing about FIRST is its transparency and the "Power House" teams give out more information and recourses than most. The key is evolution, if your team is better this year than last, that’s good. Personal growth is part of what FIRST dose, but don’t think the “Power House” Teams are sitting back, 67 doesn’t win 2 in a row by sitting back on a good year and coasting you know their developing new tricks to put in their magic bots. |
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Team 1114 has never been and will never be a 100% mentor designed and built team, despite the inaccurate assumptions of many people. Our students work hand in hand with our mentors during the entire design phase of the robot. Whether it be brainstorming discussions, preliminary sketches or actual CAD, the project is done as a team with students working with mentors. In terms of fabrication, many parts are built in house by students in our high school shop (we have a few lathes, two CNC mills, a manual mill, an assortment of drill presses and bandsaws and a variety of hand tools), while more complicated parts are sent out to be manufactured by local or not so local machine shops which sponsor the team. Finally, all assembly is done in house, 95% of which is done by our students, with minimal assistance from mentors. At competitions, all maintenance and repairs are led by the students in the pits, with mentors being called in when needed. The entire project is a collaboration between students, mentors, teachers and sponsors, with all four groups learning from each other. The students on our team come out of their experience being both educated and inspired. Sometimes I feel like I'm beating a dead horse, as it seems like we have to deal with these allegations on a fairly regular basis, both on these forums and via other communication avenues. If anyone wants to learn more about how Simbotics operates, we have a long standing open invitation for any team to visit our shop and/or practice field during the build season. If you can't make the trip, drop by our pits. Granted, we're a very busy and focused group during competitions, but if someone has a free moment I know they'd be glad to share it with you. If I seem agitated by people claiming that our robot is designed and built by the mentors, it's because I am. Any claim of that sort, is stripping credit away from the students who worked so hard to build their robot and their team. Think about how you would have felt as a high school student, if you were publicly booed and insulted, while people were saying you couldn't possibly be capable of building your robot. I'm tired of having to prepare, defend and protect our students from this onslaught of negativity. Most importantly, this isn't just about any one team. No team should ever have to deal with this type of negativity, and it happens far too often in FIRST. Not just to powerhouses, and also not just to FRC teams. (Yes, I've seen FLL teams who have been subjected to these types of attitudes and it actually makes me sick to my stomach.) We can do better. We need to do better. |
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We love your team, and we want and strive to be more like you. Sincerely, 1551 |
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All these teams who people complain about being "100% mentor built" are probably the teams that have the largest number of students returning to volunteer, mentor, etc.. Ask around to some of the FIRST alumni around where they originated from, I bet you will be surprised. That is a pretty heavy fact, and in my opinion should end the debate over mentor/student built robots flat out. |
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1. Wow! We must have hit the big time (in VRC) - we've been accused of being mentor built! 2. I was quite flattered to realize that some people actually thought that I was that good. (The students who do the designing of our VEX robots are really talented - far more than I am!) Karthik is absolutely right: WE NEED TO GET BEYOND THIS ISSUE. There are hundreds of ways to run a Competitive Robotics Team. Do what works for yours and keep trying to improve it. Don't worry about teams that do something different unless you wish to borrow some of their ideas. In that case, just go over and talk to them... Mr. Van Coach, Robodox |
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This is unbelievable. I volunteered on Curie at championships last year (the field that the Simbots were on) and ever time they had a match I was amazed with the calmness of the drive team. These team members of 1114 are some of the best students that I have seen at a FIRST event. I am ashamed to say I am part of something where people treat fellow peers in that way.
I hope that the students and mentors of the teams that took part in those comments and actions will read this thread and realize how ridiculous they are and get their act together. |
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The issue of student vs mentor designed always perplexed me. Some of our teams most blatant failures have been concieved by mentors while some of our greatest successes were designed by students.
Main topic: I have been a rather long hiatus from this forum so I had totally missed most of this discussion, but the idea that ANYONE would stoop that low over a robot is saddening. Since when were these rolling paperwieghts the reason we do this? We do this to be inspired: be it by building, outreach, cheering, or learning. We're supposed to be the one's driving the robots not the other way round >.> |
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Our team has a largely mentor-designed machine with student input on how they feel devices should articulate. In other words, students feed mentors ideas (mentors contribute as well), then mentors work on designing and developing parts, sometimes WITH students. Sometimes students even assist mentors by inventoring parts before construction. Students do the assembly.
Now, I've shared my piece. Now I'll share this: this is going to sound crass, but I don't care exactly how you design and build your machine. Our goal, is to INSPIRE. Take a look at your students -- are they INSPIRED? Do they WANT to pursue engineering, technology, or problem solving in general? I guess my point is: we all know that this is an uneven playing field. For the most part, I think we need to stop looking outside of the borders of our own team to make sure we're in-check with what I see as the primary goal of first: "inspiration" of our youth to pursue science and technology. Are WE accomplishing our mission? What's our track record? How many students have we succeeded? How many have we NOT succeeded.. and how do we lower that second number? Past that, go on and TALK to other teams, WITNESS how they work, try to GAIN information to help TRANSFORM your team to MAXIMIZE YOUR INSPIRATION. Whether it be your design process, your team structure, or your meeting structure and activities, you are building PEOPLE first... focus on THEM before you criticize a team's robot design process. This discussion should NEVER be about hating on teams... it should be about LEARNING from each other, SHARING ideas and experience, and RESPECTING the work that we all do. I love you all for what you do, but please, let's remember, the robot and competition are just celebrations of hard work and inspiration. What we're really doing is building people, and our measure of success only comes after these students graduate high school and college.... NOT how we rank amongst other teams, or the details of our design process. Good night. |
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This is really sad. I didn't know this kind of stuff even happened in first. (Although i do and i have heard it on my team) I saw first hand 1114's robot and just sat in awe. My mentor and i have joked around because the video we were watching was very slow so one frame you see them on one side of the camera and the next second one the other side. I made comments about the speed that they have and the fact that the driver can still control their robot at the speed their going is outstanding. It is really disappointing to hear that people would go out of their way to do the things that teams did to 1114. If i ever see them in real life i think i would say sorry because first is really a family and nobody should ever really treat someone else like that, EVER! even if you dont like them.
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I've been thinking about the issue a lot recently. I had an interesting insight I'd like to toss out for discussion. I wonder if the students that are being disrespectful are accurately expressing what they're upset about? I wonder if they're actually upset about this common trait of top teams: the mentors do not allow the students on their team to fail
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Look at professional sports, you dont see players going around saying your teams better than mine i hate you (sure this happens but those guys are well you know) If their really into it they'll better themselves sp that they can win the second time around. Even as a student i understand the fact that your gonna win some your gonna lose some but theres no point in screaming at teh other team. Truthfully that isn't going to change anything. The last thing i want to say is to the mentors, do something about it. Tell every single kid on your team to take 10 to 20mins and just sit down and read this entire thread or as much as possible. You'll see some conversation and i believe you'll see some change. Those kids will be embaressed and will look down upon themselves. This is the most viable solution. Maybe it will work maybe it wont try something though. For the sake of these teams. |
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This is stupid, Its just a competition. Nobody should shove,hit, or bad mouth another team because they are the "powerful" ones. The point of this competition is to win but also to make friends, help each other out, and analyze new things. Things like what to put on your robot for the next competition. The team who attacked 1114 are just being immature. It was their first robotics competition. They needed some help. Maybe the other team was more experienced and they see themselves as powerful.
Lets hope this doesn't happen in this years FRC competition. |
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i think that it is valuable to have a well cooperating team. its important because on person can destroy the whole team.
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Re: Another Culture Change
I've been lurking on this thread a while and would possibly like to see a spin off thread started with reposts or links to a few nuggets in this thread. In a world of diversity of resources, parity will always be an issue and how one deals with that is very important and a worthwhile discussion.
Now, my interest is focused along the lines of Lil' Lavery point in that resolution to this issue is to reduce the degree of disparity and not by bringing other teams down or by limiting what a mentor or sponsor can do to support the development of a robot design. A distinguishing feature of FRC is that there are very few limits to how elegant a design can be. Great robots are inspriring to many. I am interested in knowing what is needed to bring other teams up a notch or two. Having just helped organize the brand new Alamo Regional, it was difficult to explain to VIPS new to FIRST why immediately after opening ceremonies on Friday that we only had 4 or 5 robots on the field and one of them wasn't doing much. Very anti-climatic. This regional planning committee and folks associated with FIRST in Texas began team sustainability discussions immediately after grant money was found to grow both FTC and FRC in Texas. I appretiate the posts by JVN, Karthic, Paul Copoli as they describe how their teams work. One can never have enough engineers and of sufficient variety but just how many is needed and of what type. What are the key pre-season activities in which the mentors and students engage? I probably have a few ideas in this regard since I've spent 10 years building two teams without lots of resources and still struggle to get everything built before ship date. Having input on paper from other sources from successful teams may help turn the tide here in Texas to a point where we have more "A" teams than "C-". Everyone wants to be at an event where any group of three teams can win matchs against another group of three. Sometimes the game helps in that regard and IMHO why Lil Lavery is able to pull match video from 2009 of younger teams playing a smart game and winning against seasoned veterans. So my call to action is to any self-described quality team to post a white paper, reference to a white paper or reply to this thread or creat another with what mentoring resources you have, what on-site equipment you have and what kinds of shop support and then what kinds of things you do before the build season begins to maximize success on the field and in the CA judging. Key in that discussion is how the mentors interact with the students. i.e. Paul writes that 80% of the CAD work is performed by students but 100% is reviewed by himself. What other critical design elements are 100% reviewed by a key volunteer or group of mentors. How is code tested? Are students required to submit wiring schematics and present electrical/power load analysis. (if they have Al as a mentor I be they do:) ) I've seen a few of these posts in the past and if someone has the time to pull them all together into a single document, I would be extremely grateful or maybe post a word document with url links to existing white papers on this subject... |
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We allow our students to fail, but we strive to get them to fix the failure before the team gets to competition.
The team constantly is fixing failures the entire season. Squirrel, I am not sure what you meant by not allowing them to fail, but I am sure you were making a positive comment, not a negative one right? Paul |
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That's the real magic of a FIRST competition. |
Re: Another Culture Change
In general I would characterize the HOT team as mentor designed, student programmed, fabricated, and built.
Our entire team is involved in game analysis, strategy discussions, and initial design concepts and inspirations. The Chief Engineering mentors (Jim Meyer and I) lead the team lead the team through these discussions, but it is open for any student or mentor to share their general ideas. During these discussions we have had students come up with concept designs for specific subsystems (2011- Two pronged arm w/claw) or even overall robot design concepts (2009 – large hopper with roller system to feed a turreted shooter). Once we split into groups (design, mechanical, electrical, programming, field build, chairman’s, and animation). The design group and the engineering mentors assigned to design, are responsible for generating the detailed designs for the robot. How involved the students are in the details of the design depends on the age, skill, and desire of the design students. Typically, our designs are 90-100% designed and “engineered” by the mentors. I say “engineered” because much of our design process is more intuition based, than cold hard engineering calculations. The students are exposed to our thought process tri-weekly as we design parts during our meetings. A mentor’s computer is typically displayed on the projector so that the students can see and discuss how and why things are being designed certain ways. We try to explain important parts of the design to them, so they understand how and why it will work. Our design students then take our 2D AutoCAD files and create solid models of the parts and assemble them from our 2D Assembly sketches, working with the engineer to understand how parts are supposed to go together as designed. Our robots are completely student machined and assembled, with the mentors working alongside the students to make sure the parts are machined and assembled as designed. When issues are found we explain our mistakes to the students and work with them on how to correct them. We have full access to the main machine shop at the General Motors Milford Proving Grounds. Our students use the CNC mills, manual lathes, a waterjet machine, and sheet metal breaks to create the parts for our robot. The only thing the students don’t do is weld up parts (which we try to keep to a minimum). For the past two year we have been 100% fully student programmed in both C++ and Labview. We don’t have any mentors fully trained in either language, so the mentors work with the students on prioritizing general robot functions, autonomous strategies, sense of urgency, backing up files, etc.. Why is this how we function? 1. This way seems to be successful for our team, both on the field and off. We have tons of former students that have become great engineer all over the country. Many that are still participating in FIRST. 2. This is hard! Even to our mentors. We are not designers, engineers, programmers, or machinists that do this every day. It takes us 6+ weeks to get these things designed, built, and programmed. 3. Our engineers are not as good at teaching the students to do the design, as well as we are at creating the designs ourselves and explaining them. I am jealous of the teams with engineers that can teach the students how to design and still play at an incredibly high level. 4. Our mission is to work with the students to inspire them to be interested and pursue an engineering education. Not to train them to be engineers. We feel we are achieving this goal 100%. |
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My suggestion would be for you to create a thread, asking the 'self-described quality teams' to post the information/links that you are requesting in the thread. From there, you can cobble it together into a white paper/resource. That way, each team can be responsible for their contributions but not have to worry about everyone else's. Just a thought. Jane |
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I doubt there is something special about the students you have, that separates them so far from the students on other teams in terms of what they can accomplish with robots. I think the difference is in the adults on the team. I think it's based in a very strong drive to succeed in one or a few mentors, which leads eventually to a team that is an unstoppable powerhouse. I don't propose that you not try to do your best. I am (apparently in vain) just trying to get the mentors of some of the top teams to have some slight grasp of how some other people see them. I don't intend to be negative. I'm trying to help solve a problem. The problem has more than one side, though. If you can't see that, then you're going to have difficulty changing the situation. If I've offended anyone, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. |
Re: Another Culture Change
John, first let me say thank you for making this sincere reminder of the behavior we are striving to eradicate, and the ideals to which we are aspiring. It's very edifying to see someone so esteemed in the community use the prominence of their position to promote such a message.
I do have to ask, though, why you chose to include the following in the instances of unacceptable behavior. Quote:
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Jim,
I think Paul's response is reflective of how these teams work. Quote:
Jane |
Re: Another Culture Change
ok the second item on that objectionable list is 100% true
If you don't believe that a student built robot is better than one built by a professional then why does FIRST even exist?? Of course student built robots are better because they are what we are trying to produce from FIRST. Should you go around a regional stating you have a student built robot? No. But that doesn't mean you're 100% wrong. Student built robots are 100% better than any robot built by any hands that are not connected to a student. |
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1) The students on WildStang are probably not 10 times more special than students on other teams. and 2) The mentors are what makes the consistently great teams consistently great. However, I very much disagree with the leap from "the mentors are what makes a team consistently great" to "the mentors do everything". High school sports is a great example. Every state has teams that are elite year after year in a given sport (around here Farmington Hills Harrison football is a great example). Are their students inherently superior in football every year? No - it's the coaches that are the common factor (like the mentors in FIRST). Do we now make the leap that the coaches must be donning masks to look like teenagers and play quarterback and running back? It's pretty obvious that they aren't doing that. The job of the coaches is to have a winning SYSTEM, and a METHOD to teach and apply the system. If adults instill consistently elite programs with high school kids playing football, why can't the same be done in robotics? |
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