[mathking]

As the faculty advisor for 1014, I have found Ohio State's support of FIRST to be excellent. I think it is harder for colleges to support teams because there generally is not a lot of funding available. This is a disadvantage compared to a corporate sponsored team. But our mentors have established good relationships with the high school students. This has served our team well. Our Engineering Inspiration Award in 2004 was directly attributable to quality of the mentoring OSU provides our team.

As I see it, one of the strengths a college can draw upon is new blood. The make-up of the squad of mentors changes from year to year as new students come into the OSUFIRST program and older students graduate. This means we can generally draw upon a group which has a mix of experience and skills.

Colleges can also provide a good number of mentors. OSU sponsors three teams. I am not sure how many mentors are on the other two teams (677 and 1317) but we have had about a dozen for the past three years. This helps me, because I try to get as many kids involved in FIRST as possible. More mentors makes this easier.

So I don't know about other universities, but OSU has helpd to start four teams (and still mentors three) which are still running and have a combined total of 19 years of FIRST experience.