As others have said, 40k will get you a lot farther in manual machines than CNC.
A lot of the FRC parts that need CNC work tend to be sheet material. To that end, a CNC router can be a very good choice. Compared to a mill they're very cheap, and they have large work envelopes for doing panels, belly pans, etc. They're more accurate than plasma, and cheaper than waterjet or laser. They're also more versatile than those machines, as they can do "2.5D" work like pocketing, counterboring, champfering, engraving, etc. Also, you can build one yourself, they're not exceptionally complicated for FRC-trained people, as long as you put in the research time (CNCzone.com is your friend)
I'm currently designing a (pretty hardcore) router for BadgerBOTS, I'd be happy to share my CAD files, design notes, expertise, etc. with anyone interested (Just keep in mind that we're fairly early in the project). And my STUDENTS (Hi Max and Newton) should hopefully be thinking about rounding up some sponsors
For your 40k budget, you could easily get a CNC router and two or three decked out knee mills (power feed DRO, non-R8 spindle, pneumatic drawbar, VFD spindle, Kurt vise, etc) and plenty of tooling.
For quick parts, I'm also a big fan of Accurite's Millpwr conversational mill control. It can do all kinds of hole patterns, simple pockets, periphery milling, and even complex pockets and shapes. The really nice thing is that programs can be made up in seconds on the machine. And, if you have one with no Z-axis control, it's almost impossible to crash, because the operator has control of the Z, and it's pretty hard to smack the tool into things when it's at the top of it's travel. The cheapest I've found of them is around $25k
As others have also said, comparing horizonal bandsaws to verticals is pretty much apples and oranges; they're made for different tasks. I'd take a vertical though, because it can be used for many different tasks. The horizonal type is really only good for cutting stock, and if you really need to, that can be done on a vertical (Or just get a freshman and a hacksaw
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Cutting aluminum on a tablesaw sounds like a completely terrible idea to me. I don't use a tablesaw unless I really have to, and I'm always wary of high schoolers using them, because there's a lot of things that can go wrong. And when they go wrong, they tend to go very, very wrong.
IF you're going to cut aluminum on a tablesaw, make sure you have a mentor supervising who really, really knows what they're doing, and knows what to do if something bad happens.