[Bob Steele]

During build season our team meets Monday through Thursday 6 until 9 PM
We try to keep to those hours so that team members can adjust their study schedules around them. We have a parent staffed study hall these same days from the end of school to 5:00 PM which is not required but highly recommended. We meet every Saturday from 9:30 until 3:30. This means that our base hours during build season are 18 hours per week.

We usually also work Fridays and many Sundays depending on what is going on. Some of the subteams also will meet on their own at other times.

The requirement to maintain satisfactory status for competition is to have 80% of these hours.... Academic requirements at our school are pretty high and students need time to complete homework and assignments.

Students may stay on the team but will not be travelling to competition if they do not meet the 80% time requirement or if they are failing in any class.

Like any other team, we have some members that work much harder both in effort and in time than others. If students are seen not working on robotics projects during scheduled time they are asked to leave and go home. These student can become a big distraction pretty quickly and they don't realize that they are bringing the productivity of other students down by their actions.

Repeat offenders are counseled by mentors and if the behavior continues, parents are brought in for a conference.

Our team is also a class and grades and credit require us to show real work and project accomplishment.

With our schedule an individual student should be putting in approximately 100 hours during build season. I have some students who do twice that.
When I hear that student team members have put in 300-400 hours I really question how they could do that and still attend school and achieve academic goals as well.

Someone who puts in 400 hours would have to work 50 hours per week which would amount to 24 on the weekend (12 hours each day) and over 5 hours each weekday. (from 5 - 10 each night) As a coach, teacher and mentor I think that this is excessive and will lead to academic and other issues. Students need to learn about having a full life that includes time for family and other things.

Planning the work and maximizing the time is what gives good results. We spend a great deal of time in the off-season doing just that so we can be more efficient.

We usually build pretty decent robots and have a fair share of success both on and off the field.

Of course, your mileage may vary.