FIRST:
"FIRST Robotics Competition challenges teams of students and their mentors to solve a common problem" (
www.usfirst.org)
I must hear the explanation to this, 'challenges teams of students' wow its a great challenge for students to have engeneers plan and a shop build a robot. From what I see, alot of teams don't have too much of a student imput in them.
And rookie or not, students are the base for this cometition.
"concepts of science, math, engineering, and invention are exciting and interesting" (
www.usfirst.org)
I cannot understand how one can be inspired without any hands on activity. If people don't try things themselves, and are just told...they will not be inspired, instead they will not enjoy the experience, they will feel like the back up goaltender in a hockey win or an outsider who dosen't get the chance to do anything.
Im not quite sure weather any of this makes sense, but an awful lot of you seem to be backing up the way FIRST is now, which is fine, but in my opinion students should be more involved then they are, because after all this whole event is based on the students.