Quote:
Originally Posted by Libby K
I'm looking for clarification here. (Like I said in my last post, one of my jobs this week with having the winners up here is to help improve the Dean's List Award...) Is the encouragement of juniors to apply (because of the benefits it can have) really tainting the image of the award? I am being 100% honest when I say I don't understand.
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I took some time before replying to this thread because I wanted to make sure I represented the ideas of multiple seniors accurately. What is missing from this discussion so far is the opinions from the Class of 2012.
I conducted an anonymous survey of our team's class of 2012, on SurveyMonkey.com. I asked the following questions
1. Do you believe that FIRST encouraging mentors to nominate juniors influenced Team 79 Mentors to select two juniors in 2012?
2. "Does encouraging mentors to nominate Juniors taint the Dean's List award?" -Libby Kamen I would really appreciate your views on this question. No one is being judged or argued with. Class of 2012 deserves to be heard.
Of 6 seniors, I have the results from 4.
Question 1 is mixed opinions of Yes and No.
Question 2 is unanimously Yes.
Before anyone posts "The class of 2012 seniors should not feel that way because..." Please keep in mind a few things
1: Libby asked for our opinion, the best way to not receive them is to criticize opinions once they are given
2: Whether they should or should not feel that way is not the point. The point is that I am verifying there is a negative perception in at least a small group of people, and there exists the possibility this is true with many other teams.
3: If the class of 2012 feels this way now, what does that do to all of the effort currently going into building a strong alumni base
While I can not give the opinions of the mentors, or verify anything about how they actually chose the nominees this year, here are the facts that give a little background of where the 2012 seniors on my team are coming from:
1: Specifics on how the mentors choose the Dean's List nominees has not been told to us, leaving us only to create our own perceptions.
2: In 2010 my team nominated 2 Seniors, and again in 2011 the team nominated 2 Seniors. In 2012 the team nominated 2 Juniors.
I would like to take this moment to say both Juniors and Seniors this year did contribute a lot to our team,
and the juniors did deserve to be nominated for the Dean's List, as Barry stated I am
not trying to take anything away from them. I am only trying to help FIRST understand what perceptions the seniors have, because we were asked for our opinion.
FIRST can not control how its' teams make management decisions, but should be aware that yes, a simple encouragement to nominate juniors can create a perception that taints the award.
If any team decides to nominate only juniors, this how I would suggest they handle it:
Please be upfront and honest with the students as it is negatively impacting and tell the seniors at the beginning of the year that they are not going to be picked this year, it is heartbreaking to do this in the middle of a competition when teamwork is key to success. However, make sure the seniors are recognized for their contributions to the team in some other fashion, and provide other avenues for them to help them receive scholarships and opportunities. I am glad the juniors received this opportunity but do not believe Deans List should give preference to a grade or age. It should only be about leadership, what they have done to spread FIRST to the community, and show gracious professionalism on and off the field. Please have the committee brainstorm on a system where seniors can be nationally recognized without it being at the expense of juniors' opportunities to be accepted to college.