[Brandon Holley]

Wow, what a thread.

Collin's points about mediation are spot on - this is a serious issue that shouldn't be swept under the rug. It's not about a single document, or event, or volunteer, its a serious cancer inside the FIRST culture of a region. If you haven't been a 20 something up and comer in FIRST, you have to understand that seeing the other perspective is going to be very difficult for you. If you haven't had the responsibility of running an event to ensure 60 teams have an amazing time, you have to understand that seeing the other perspective is going to be very difficult for you.

As a 28 year old, now running a team for almost a decade, event chairing official FRC events, I really empathize with the frustrations I'm hearing from the low-mid aged college students in FRC. I've been disrespected, ignored and singled-out. I've also overreacted, lost my cool and missed the point. I get it. I've been there. My team is filled with college-aged mentors with a sprinkle of upper 20 somethings, I understand the frustrations on both sides of this discussion right now.

As an early 20s FRC mentor and volunteer, FIRST regional committee and volunteerism felt a lot like an Old Boys Club. You needed to know someone, or you weren't going to be involved how you wanted to. It sucked, plain and simple.

Were my expectations probably overly ambitious? Yeah, most certainly. But this is FIRST - you have a massive base of extremely talented young people thats growing every year who are being programmed to change cultures and break through barriers. Can we seriously expect them to just take a back seat until someone deems them 'ready'? (Subsequently I think thats why reading that in a document, even if it was only distributed once is what set off this storm.)

I liken it to a performance review at any employer. If you're a young employee, your growth and career path is a topic that is extremely important. Managers need to ensure their employees have a clear understanding of what it will take to reach the next level. Where employees get disgruntled is when they don't have that visibility and there is infrequent communication about where they stand. This is is what I am hearing when I read the posts from the many college-aged volunteers/mentors in this thread. They basically don't see the path - whether it exists or not isn't the problem to focus on, its that these eager-to-help people don't see it.


Honestly, the best thing to happen to New England on a volunteerism front was Districts. The issue was forced and the floodgates were opened. The barriers were broken. We no longer could rely on Dave Goric to Head Ref every event, or Kate Pilotte/Jacob Komar to FTA every event. These are awesome key volunteers, but we needed to diversify and holes were filled.

The hard part is you have to make a leap at some point. You can inch the cliff closer and closer by training keys for years ahead of time, but at some point in time - the region will need to jump. You may not see exactly where the key volunteers will be coming from, but the point is if there is never a hole to fill, or even visibility through consistent communication, the potential key volunteers will never materialize.

I'm super proud of New England, and its why I'm bragging about it now. We have an awesome mix of veterans who KNOW THEIR SH*T, and a spectacular group of eager 20-somethings - each group is getting a chance to shine- and its awesome to watch.

-Brando