Re: How to get students join the team?
 

We have a similar problem, only we have a total of 11 students right now. We've tried everything from middle school presentations, participating in the local fair, you name it. We just started 2 FLL teams and we know we have one 8th grader who is joining in September. We also have an Engineering Academy through our Vocational & Technical school and when the the VoTech has their Quality Cup (open house of all the academies) the Engineering Academy usually lets me have a table for robot stuff and I drive the Vex around while our freshmen give the details of the team. we actually got one of the freshmen who was working another table come over to me and he was talking to me about joining and now he is our mascot and is starting to learn how to do electrical work

Re: How to get students join the team?
 

no no no. i didn't post that and as soon as i figure out how to delete it...ugh i think it's time for a CD password change. i need to protect myself from the programmers/expert hackers of the team..

Re: How to get students join the team?
 

One of the things we tell students when we go out to schools is that we need people to do lots of things. The example we give is of a chef going the team.

We sure could use one to stop all these McDonalds runs.......

Re: How to get students join the team?
 

I feel your pain, my team consists of 14 girls from grades 9-12. I've found a fantastic way to advertise though is through videos of prior competitions, of your robot in action, etc.

Also, a HUGE thing is the merchandise. As soon as you having flaming unicorns on the back of your hoodies, everyone wants to come to the competition. I'm not kidding, unicorns are a big deal here.

If you can, see if there are any FLL teams in the area and advertise your team there. Those kids know what FIRST is about and how much fun the competition is.

Another thing is incorporating your robots in school events. Genghis Khan, last year's robot, has been part of this year's Senior Skits for our school and PIMP, this year's robot, is going to be putting up our team banner next to all of the "real" sports banners.


And trust me, the most important thing you can do is have your team members show some team spirit and wear their t-shirts, hoodies, buttons, etc. Most people are actually interested in joining, they just don't know that much about it and they don't know who to talk to. Make your team available to them, not some super secret clique.

Re: How to get students join the team?
 

As others have said, it's all about advertising. They've posted great ideas about that here, so I'm not going to re-hash them. From what I've seen, the biggest reason kids don't get involved (especially freshmen) is the time commitment. It's not like soccer, football, baseball, basketball, or any other sport - this isn't something they've done before and thus know it's worth the time commitment. It's something that sounds like fun, but they just don't know for sure that it will be.

So, your job is to first get them interested in learning more, and then get them hooked. Advertising will get them interested, getting them hooked takes a bit more. It takes getting them in a lab or shop and doing some actual work. It takes getting them interacting with the rest of the team and seeing for themselves how fun and stimulating robotics can be.

We started a "summer camp" for prospective students last year, and it seemed to work really well. We got a lot of incoming freshmen and sophomores to show up for a few hours a night for two weeks, and worked with them building Junior Theremins from this site: http://www.madlab.org/kits.html

Those are great little projects that can be done quickly, get someone hooked, and give them something they can take home with them.

So, I recommend once you get a group of interested people, get them in the shop and interacting with your team before the season starts. Focus on something that requires a low time commitment but teaches them valuable skills while having fun.

Re: How to get students join the team?
 

As a part of your recruiting, I would also suggest advertising the scholarships that are available to students on your team who participate in the program. This can be a good way to attract upperclassmen who are certain they'd like to study STEM subject areas after high school.

Usually these students end up wishing they were a part of the team earlier!

Re: How to get students join the team?
 

As people have mentioned, robot demos definitely get a lot of people hooked. However, don't just show off the robots, but let prospective newbies drive them!
You do have to be careful about mentioning college to people. The people who sign up for the ability to add robotics to their transcript generally quit the team pretty quickly once they figure out how it actually works. We'll mention it it on one of the posters that we put up around our school before our interest meeting, but at the actual meeting we're very careful to emphasize that while FIRST involvement is a powerful tool, you will only get out of FIRST what you put into it...

Re: How to get students join the team?
 

We have found that it's easier to get students involved in the team during off-season events. We have a lot of team building outings during the summer and that's where we usually invite our incoming students, that way they get to know the other students and the mentors in a less-stressful environment. We usually do bowling, minigolf, or trips to the beach, stuff like that.

But advertising is also a big part of it, as other people have said.

Another, slightly more corny idea, is a "bring a friend to robotics" day on your team. That's actually how I got involved my freshman year.

I hope this helps! :)

Re: How to get students join the team?
 

As previously mentioned, we get most of our new recruits through presentations at the middle schools at the end of the year. We also have a lot of siblings and friends of siblings.

I think something that really helps a lot is an easy to navigate website. We've gotten a lot of recruits simply from them seeing our website on in out displays and signing up via the form on our page.

EDIT: I forgot to add this...

Believe it or not, but we make a huge effort to loose the "Robotics" connection. While it might seem counter-productive or "not in the spirit of FIRST", I feel that a lot of students are scared away by the word robotics...they feel that they aren't smart enough or that robots are only for the "nerdy" kids. When we give recruitment presentations, we promote all of the other equally as important roles on the team (business, art/graphic design, music, writing, public relations) This helps us include more of the high school community and bring in kids who would never even have considered joining.

Re: How to get students join the team?
 

That's funny, we do almost the exact opposite! We advertise it as all about the robot, and have the robot out in front of the school as much as possible. When our students talk, they invariably start out with something like "When I joined the team, I didn't know how to do anything! The mentors and returning members spend a lot of time making sure you learn how to do everything that's needed to build a robot (even how to use a drill properly!)." We make sure we put a big emphasis on "no experience necessary" every time we talk with a prospective student.

Of course, we also talk about all the other functions on the team - the need for PR, scouting, fundraising, etc... but that's not the focus.

Re: How to get students join the team?
 

Siblings are a HUGE part of a team... Both my older brothers have been on the team and now i am .... my sister will be on it next year. Also my Dad's company is our biggest sponsor, My mom also helps out and will be helping with the business people next year ... We are a FIRST Family !

Re: How to get students join the team?
 

great ideas,
we will adopt those ideas
thank you!