Quote:
Originally Posted by Joseph Smith
I know exactly what I'm missing out on during build season. A little bit of sleep, lots of time on Netflix and maybe some exercise. On the other hand, if I chose not to mentor, I would miss out on some of the greatest experiences of my life, and the opportunity to help new team members get as much out of the program as I did.
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It's easy to say you would just spend "lots of time on Netflix" if you didn't mentor a team, but you're totally missing his point. College is one of the best times in your life to try new things, meet new people, and challenge yourself in different ways. If you're putting aside all that college has to offer to try and mentor a team in college, you're missing out on these opportunities. Or worse, you try and juggle robotics + regular extracurricular activities and your grades suffer as a result.
I agree with Joe Matt, despite being a college mentor my freshman year. If I had to give general advice to students in FRC, knowing little about their situation, I would suggest a year off of full time mentoring. Mentors are different than students, and six months into college isn't a ton of time to learn, grow, and gain the life experience an adult mentor has.
All of that said, I know some people that mentor in college who can handle the responsibility, and maintain an active presence in campus extracurricular, AND get pretty good grades. These people are the exception to the rule and certainly don't need my advice. The majority of students,
even the students who could do it in high school!!!, are going to struggle with this. So I'm not trying to say you specifically shouldn't mentor, but that I agree with the general advice.
I know how it is. Giving up FRC is extremely hard because frankly, at that time in your life there's not a lot else going on that feels so meaningful. For many FRC becomes part of their identity. But before you can be a really effective mentor, you have to grow up. It's hard to say I regret all of the choices that put me where I am today, but if I could do it again, I would have stuck to the sidelines and helped in a much smaller way for my first years. I wasn't ready.