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Originally Posted by SGS
At Alamo and Lone Star we have girl come to our pit saying "You guys are an all girl team? Really? The girls on our team just do outreach and PR." If this is the result of a co-ed team, I fear for the future of engineering.
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I'm not on an all-girls team (last year we had 3 girls and 25 guys, this year we have 7 girls and 30 guys), but I have found that a lot of people are surprised when they find out that I do a lot of mechanical and machine work. I try to talk to other teams as much as I can at events, and most people sound really impressed about that. I think that I've only had three or four people blatantly say "our girls pretty much just do PR," but it is still obvious that a lot of other teams are like that as well.
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Originally Posted by Grim Tuesday
You would be hard pressed to find a school/area with enough money/sponsors to support two teams so close.
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Welcome to Michigan, namely SE Michigan. Oakland County has an insane density of FRC teams, and many of them are big-name teams to boot: Killer Bees, Wings of Fire, HOT, RUSH. I know that Rochester Community Schools sponsors two teams (201 and 245). Returning to Wayne County, there are two teams located in the Grosse Pointes, one from the public schools (1189) and one from a local private school (3175)...and we are by no means a large city. Our public school system will not allow students who do not attend our public schools to join 1189 due to liability, tax, and political issues.
Back on topic:
I don't have a problem with single-gender/"exclusive" teams. Single-gender schools will often lead to single-gender teams. While all-girl teams don't give the girls the kind of real-world immersion into science and technology that a co-ed team would - the male-dominated environment - they do eliminate the gender-domination issues that sometimes happen on co-ed teams. No girl will be faced with sexual discrimination of any kind on an all-girls team. For some, that's the only barrier preventing them from doing mechanical work, or even joining a team. The girls will still have to work with male students at events. They're not totally isolated from the real world. No matter how much anyone argues "well, they have to get used to dealing with men," that doesn't solve the problem of girls not joining a team because they're scared of the boys.
Is it fair to the boys who want to join a team, but said team restricts itself to females? No. So therefore, should all-girls (or all-boys, or all-Jewish, or all-anything) teams not be allowed? IMO, no - you'll be hard-pressed to find a blanket rule that benefits everyone. I think a rule saying that a FRC team must be open to any student willing to join would hurt far more people than it would help, since many districts, schools and clubs only allow students from that district, school or club to join that organization's sponsored activities.
Since we're talking about female underrepresentation in engineering:
I think that I am very fortunate in my immersion into engineering. I joined my team during the first year that they started really pressing females to do robot-related work, and thus I did not face any discrimination when I started working in the shop. Still, I would not have gone to my first work session if I had not gone with my friend. I didn't know anyone on the team at that point, and was a very shy freshman who had real problems with introducing myself to new people. If I hadn't gone with her, I wouldn't have gone at all, and probably would have stopped showing up shortly after Kickoff because I wouldn't have had anything to do (we didn't really have any kind of designated PR team at that point, just a few upperclassmen that I didn't know and were not actively recruiting PR members). By the end of freshman year, I was a lathe operator. My friend dominated the mill. We were both part of the uncrate team and the pit crew. She became our build group leader sophomore year. We never faced discrimination from the male members of our team. Due to my establishment as a hardworking team member, I haven't had any problems from new mentors and students over the past few years.
If I had joined an all-girls team, I would not have felt so intimidated about going to work sessions. However, I don't think that I would be as comfortable around guys as I am now. I'm sure that my involvement in other male-dominated activities (radio astronomy team, drumline) has helped with that, but I joined the radio astronomy team because of the influence of a female teacher, and the drumline because of the influence of a female friend. It takes a lot of willpower for a girl just out of the torments of middle school to find her place in a male environment without another female to help her along the way.
As a note, I don't think that 1189 has had a female engineering mentor until this year, which is our 9th season. We didn't have a female build group leader until the 2008-09 season, or a female build captain until 2009-10.