Quote:
Originally Posted by Calvin Hartley
I'd like to expound on this, as I can relate. Heavily. I participated in FLL for 6 years before joining my FRC team. Not only that, but my FLL team was very successful. We got better and better over the years too. By our last season we decided to go to the World Festival. So we did, we won the State Championship and got to go to Worlds. All this to say that our coaches and mentors did nothing. After this I jumped into FRC. I tried to keep an open mind and not compare it to FLL, but even that as hard. There were times I would get frustrated with how much the mentors did. By now I've gotten used to it (mostly).
I think the key is to understand the difference between the programs. FLL is "designed to get kids excited about engineering and technology*". The tools FLL uses are also built for kids to use. I think at their age, if they weren't doing the work they probably wouldn't get much out of it. I know I wouldn't have. FRC is vastly different, it has much more advanced machines, older students, and a far different mentor-student interaction. FRC's goal is to inspire, regardless of how the inspiration comes about. They strive to inspire "by engaging them in exciting mentor-based programs.**" If an FRC mentor has to make a part to inspire a student, that's fine. If the student can then make a part himself, that's great!
To summarize, I think FLL is to get kids excited. "This is fun!!" FRC is to get them inspired. "Look at what we/I can do."
Well I hope this post makes some sense, it's all just my thoughts and opinions. Hope it helps.
-Calvin
*From the FLL website.
**From the FRC website. |
Calvin, I believe you have hit the nail on the head. It is this inconsistency between the FLL program and FRC program, that leads to this frustration. I am the OP's dad and programming mentor. We too had a improving run in FLL runs, and in 2008 placed 2nd in Michigan, and represented MI at the US open in Dayton. Not only is there a difference in who is to do the work, in FLL there is no Teleop either, so programming is much more important aspect of robot performance in FLL than FRC. There was just a post on CD about teams that don't use sensors, and are very successful at the FRC level.
The OP was blessed his freshmen year, with programming seniors that refused to touch the programming laptop, and made him do everything in labview. They were programming, he was learning labview. The second year, he was able to pick up and run with the ball without much mentoring, except for defining what we needed to work on during build, Beescript Autonomous, Holding on the bridge with encoders, ball shooter speed control with pid, drive straight with gyro feedback, encoder distance control..
So yes, "I don't do anything", but that is really only a statement based on today. Today I have a strong programmer on the team, that takes ownership of his work, is very happy to have the weight of competition on his shoulders, and is inspired.
Tomorrow, when I don't have that, I might have to do some work. But whoever the programmer or programmers is then, will understand the code, debug the code, and understand the limitations of the control system, before it goes on his, or her bot. If we only drive, that's ok, if we don't use sensors, thats ok, many teams are competitive doing that too. In fact TORC made it to nationals without encoders and gyro's the Breakaway year.
As pointed out many times in these posts, the yardstick is to inspire, so if a team inspires, I am good with it. You can't really measure inspiration of the team members, from an overheard mentor conversation.
I know, I would hate to be judged by some of the mentor conversations I have had in the past...
