Quote:
Originally Posted by sanddrag
The other thing that gets me is I saw even 2nd grade classes get funded. Not to say that teaching elementary school is any easier than teaching high school (it likely is not) but how many 2nd grade teachers do you know who can design in CAD and operate such a machine, and teach 6 year olds to do the same....
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One could posit something similar about high school students that build robots. 3D printers are additive and have only slight forces at work on most of their parts. One can buy extruders basically fully assembled. It should be well within the facility of most FIRST teams to assemble a printer when there are kits available. You can build a Prusa i3 out of mostly wood.
On the other hand: a grade school teacher might have a harder time justifying the hands-on likely to fall on that teacher because the students lack the dexterity to build a printer. They may need a more 'out-of-the-box' experience. We don't ask Jr. FLL to operate a lathe and we do hand them things we feel they can safely interact with. It is possible to build a 3D printer with mostly Legos.
This is just to say: obviously the donors have their reasons. There may be more logic to it than it appears.
I have to wonder: will the FRC people with their hopes set here accept a cheaper non-Makerbot printer and what if they can't get it in time for this build season?