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Originally Posted by Steve W
To believe that this isn't happening is hiding your head in the sand. Things have been caught and when brought forward, FIRST hid their head in the sand. In 2002 and 2003 there were teams that broke the rules and when confronted argued the point so tough that FIRST allowed the transgression. THIS is one of the worst things that could have happened. FIRST is basically not enforcing the rules because, in my humble opinion, they don't want to discourage teams or ban them from a competition. All this has done is lower the GP for everyone.
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Well with expansion does come some unfortunate side effects. Not every company who joins FIRST sees the opportunities provided to youth, the life lessons learned from the experience and the fun everyone involved has.
All they see is trophies and for the amount of money they put into such and such a team they want to see a return for their investment and they could care less how they go about getting it.
FIRST is just not big enough an organization to watchdog every single thing every single team does and if they start tackling who is cheating or not I'm afraid it's going to devolve into what is or isn't cheating (is building a robot strictly for the students or can the robot be mentor built, ect.) and next thing you know FIRST is bogged down in endless debate about the rules and then no one is having fun anymore.
The only answer I can possibly think of is an exclusive team of mentors from
each and every team who preside over the rules and regualtions of FIRST and police the teams autonoumous from their own team and other teams influences and thus can pass just decsions on such matters without fear of retaliation.