Quote:
Originally Posted by JohnM
Hi guys. So now that my fourth and last FRC season as student has came to close and I am now a FIRST Alumni and pretty soon going to be a mentor, how have you guys that used to be alumni handled this?
Since 2013 I have been part of an FRC team as a student. I am going to college now where the rookie team I was part of for the Stronghold season (Glitch 5854) is hosted, so thats pretty awesome. But I feel like it's going to feel weird now that I'm going to be a mentor. I feel like at competitions I will feel out of place. On the team and on CD I will no longer be "Lead Programmer" or "Programmer" I will be listed as mentor. I'm no longer going to be part of student decisions or any of that sort. I know that I will adapt to it, but it seems odd.
How are you guys (class of 2016) going to handle now being a FIRST Alumni and mentor? How have other former first year alumni/mentors handled being part of a team they were part of as student? I would really like to get some pointers or advice on this from other alumni. Seems so surreal.
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First off, there are a lot of other threads (ex.
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...35#post1576035) dedicated to this topic; it's one that has impacted many people who do and do not read this forum, including myself.
Secondly, my best piece of advice is to, at a minimum, explore other options other than mentoring FRC at your school. There are SO many other things to do in college that most people never did in high school, and many more types of people to talk to and learn from.
I'm not saying do not mentor: ultimately, you need to make that decision based on how much time you can/want reasonably commit to the team and keep your grades at a high level. However, if you've done as I've explained above and budget your time appropriately, then I don't believe there is anything to keep you from mentoring.
A few other points:
1. Don't mentor your old team for at least a couple years. The difficulty of the transition is magnified and it is harder to separate yourself when you need the time for other things (like school, for example). There are countless stories of people where this has not worked. If you are going to mentor in freshman year, find another team.
2. If you don't feel like you have the time to mentor, volunteer, as many have already said. It's really a great way to give back to the FIRST community without committing to long team hours. This is magnified if you're going to school in an area transitioning to districts.