[Beth Sweet]

Originally Posted by santosh

People (stupid freshmen) join
robotics not knowing what robotics is all about. They want to build
and they don't understand that if they stay with the club, that they
will move to a build team.

Santosh,

As an older member on your team, you are the one in charge of teaching them what it's about. While I know that you apologized above for your comment, I want to remind you that a big part of FIRST is to educate everyone, even those "stupid freshmen" about science and technology. Yes, you were trying to make a joke, and that's fine, however, you really need to watch what you say if you want people to take it correctly. That's part of the problems with typing, not enough emotional expression.

As to the part about not wanting to decrease your team size, the issue that you are experiencing occurs with every team no matter what the size. There will always be people who want to be active and there will always be those who are in it to see what they can get. As to making the others more dedicated? Well, that is one somewhat negative thing about our competition. There is a limited amount of work that can be done and a limited number of people that can do it. Perfect project management would allow the maximum number of people to do the maximum amount of work to stay productive, but sometimes, there's just not enough for everyone to do. Keep everyone as busy as you can, and if they choose not to be active, don't give up on them, just keep working with them. Maybe next year they'll change their thoughts when they see how much those who participated actively got out of it. And here's one quick hint that some people don't want you to know. There are some people that, no matter what, FIRST just won't make a difference for. There are some who won't be affected. So just try to make them have as much fun as they can, while they are with the team.