[KenWittlief]

but FIRST is not intended to be a crash course in engineering, or even an offseason mini engineering training program

not all mentors can spend time with the team all year - if your team works on design and codeing and control skills all year - thats great

but not to sound like a pompous snodwod - but a small handfull of engineers could start working with the students at the kickoff meeting, teaching them as they go during the 6 weeks, and have an excellent, technologically advanced, and very competitive machine - and then go home after the comps are over

remember the core idea here is only to give the HS students a taste of what it would be like to be an engineer - to see the light at the end of the education tunnel

if your team has a high retention rate, and the same students come back every year, and they are able to do 99% of the design and build work - thats outstanding - I commend you for that accomplishment

and by the same token, if your team has 100% new students every year, and the engineers and mentors have to spoon feed you for the first week or two, but you end up with a great machine in the end, thats super too.