[ToddF]

This fall we built a practice field at the Virginia Air and Space center. We had drive team practice (open to the public) every Saturday. We let everyone know that all students were welcome to come practice driving our last year's robot. The mentor/student leadership selected a primary and secondary drive team from among those students who we felt earned their spots through a combination of demonstrated skill and commitment. It happens that those people on the drive team are also among the most involved when it comes to building the robot (no surprise there). If students develop problems with grades or attendance during build season, they lose their spots and people are promoted into them from below. Hasn't been a problem so far.

Having people selected ahead of build season allows for real input from the driver and operator into the controls and preferred control behaviors of the robot. The drive team can also work together as a team to develop an effective communications vocabulary for in-match communication. We are lucky to have a mentor on the team this year who has worked with tank crews, who use this type of communication between tank commander, driver, and gunner. He says that if tankers can go from detecting a target to hitting it in two or three seconds, there is no reason a robotics team can't use the same techniques to be just as effective. It's gonna be a good year...