[Chris is me]

Originally Posted by Oblarg

Respectfully, I think it's a bit too simplistic to proclaim this as an absolute. Student involvement is important. Let's consider an extreme case: if a team showed up to competition that consisted of a handful of students who drove the robot, with literally everything else handled by the mentors, do you think that ought to have "not the slightest bit of relevance" to judged awards at all? There's a reason that the judges talk to students, not to mentors.

That is why I followed with an inspired student explaining the mechanism in detail, which is basically the criteria for the award. If a student understands and can explain it, who cares who built it? (Though this is an academic debate mostly; it's not like my team's robots have no student involvement)

Now here, I agree entirely. But if a student is able to professionally explain a mechanism (both in terms of operation and manufacture), what reason would the judges have to believe that the mentors did all the work?

They wouldn't, which is why technical judging went off without a hitch for us. The only reason they would have this suspicion is if they sent culture judges to your pit asking them 18 different "gotcha questions", then jumped on your kids for saying a sponsor EDMed a single part of the robot. The witch hunt has to stop. It's harassment, and it's casting broad judgments on entire teams based on preconceived notions.