Is your school public or private? We are a public school district--three public high schools, a charter school and home school students. But we operate under the guidelines of the public school district.
How many years has your team been in existence? 18
What support does your school or district give to your team (money, facilities, other donations)? We are required to have stipend paid teachers at all meetings so the district pays for the stipends for the three teachers. We have a building/shed that was donated by a sponsor that sits on school property. The district pays for any insurance or utility bills for that building. Students are allowed to participate at tournaments with excused absences.
What does your overall team budget look like? What portion of that budget is contributed by your school? We are a large team, 70 students this year, and our budget for this year is $126,000. We do not receive any funds from our school district. The budget is roughly 40% from sponsors/fundraisers, 60% from student contributions.
Does the school provide faculty and/or co-curricular paid positions for the team? If so, how many? We are required to have teachers (see above) but we have to find the teachers. We are VERY fortunate that we now have STEM-related teachers from each of the three public high schools. But we've had years where we've used elementary school teachers who were parents or even a school secretary in order to fulfill the stipend teacher requirement.
Does your district have FLL/FTC teams as well? How are those funded/supported in relation to FRC? We have FLL teams in each of our elementary schools and middle schools. We worked with a local foundation, the Education Foundation of Martin County, who wrote grants to fund the program. Each school team works differently as to how they provide for students in their schools. Some use it through the after-school program and some use it through their gifted students program. As a team, we provide student mentors to assist the schools. But FLL is funded outside the district. FTC teams are currently organized outside the school district (4H, Boy Scouts, Civil Air Patrol).
Does your school have a robotics course or series of programs? Is FRC worked on during these hours? FRC is not offered as a school program. Due to our structure, we are an evening and weekends extracurricular program.
What does your team do for your school? We support our schools in their STEM efforts through robot demonstrations. But because our team is from each school, we don't do a lot at the schools that is directly for the schools.
We made a presentation to our school board just last month. We are truly trying to shift the paradigm that STEM isn't something left for whatever grants can be received but should be a priority of the curriculum and the budget. We have outgrown our building and have sought help from the private sector and the public sector (local government). We are now seeking help from the school district for additional space. We are seeking options as to availability. It's a long process, but we're in it for the long haul.
If we can help further in any way, please feel free to reach out to us. We're happy to share the budget, the building plans or whatever information you may need to make your case. We would appreciate if you could share the results of your meeting as well.
We can be reached at
frcteam180@gmail.com.
Thank you and good luck. nzp