Originally Posted by davidthefat

I do not mean "wrong" as in we are attracting bad kids, but we are attracting kids who already have a set goal of going into STEM. Aren't we trying to attract kids who are on the other end of the spectrum? My mentality was that majority of the kids on the team would have joined regardless of the mission as long as it had robots. I can confidently say majority of the students who are on robotics already had the vision to become engineers and scientists, or at least were entertaining the thought of it.

We are trying to get students into STEM, however we are also trying to teach the students who currently want to be engineers and scientists more than they would have learned without FIRST. Plus, it would be no fun to say "join our awesome robotics team, but only if you don't want to." IDK about your team(s), but for mine it's the people who already know they want to be an engineer or have been converted to becoming an engineer who go out and try to get the rest of the school interested.

What can we do to attract kids other than those who already have a goal in STEM? I know there are teams with dedicated business, and other non "build" departments within the team. However, is that really fulfilling FIRST's mission? I noticed many of the students end up doing something non build related. I am in no way trying to put the build team up on a pedestal, but I do notice it, like with many others have. Are we doing the job correctly if 80% of the team is in the stands cheering with a handful of people in the pits working on the robot? I have never been a "non build" team member; I have always been a programmer and on the drive team. It breaks my heart to see kids feel "disposable"; hell, I am the lead programmer and I feel that way sometimes.

I've seen this before. Heck, it's going on in my own team, and I feel the same way about it. It's not that the students don't already want to join, a lot of them just think they aren't the type of person for robotics, and then move on. You need to preach the ideas that: A) Robotics is a learning experience. You require no prior knowledge to join, an dew can guarantee that if you put your mind to it, you will become a first rate engineer on the team, and B) Robotics. is. fun. If there is any part of your team or the competition that isn't fun, then you are the one responsible for it, and it is your job to make it fun. If people on a team aren't having fun, then the team is doing something wring. FIRST makes these competitions the "hardest fun you will ever have". As for your view on the "disposable" student, your arguments with the students in the stands, and a few in the pits is how most competitions are. For us, we will only allow the key 10 people on our team in the pits. Everyone here can agree that the pits get full. Especially with a robot in there. BUT, the students in the stands have other important jobs. Scouting, cheering, all are important jobs the students in the stands have that make the team function.

Are we allocating the jobs correctly? I know, not everyone was made to be a Programmer, Welder, Electrician or anything, but with the ~100 students who signed up for the team makes me worried. I know that all 100 will not show up, but a big chunk will. There are simply not enough jobs for that many kids, and I worry that many of them will be turned away from STEM for that.