[Beth Sweet]

"FIRST will start to discourage many teams from participating when they realize that the robot they spent six weeks on has no chance of success at the competition" ~Ryan F

As much as I hate to full out disagree with you and say you're wrong, you are. My kids came to competition this year with a robot that was... um, not the most competitive at the competition. The first practice match, the entire gripper fell apart. Luckily for us, a team with more engineers and resources was able to help us out and provide us with a well designed and very functional replacement. Did this discourage my kids? Well of course they wished they could be the best, who doesn't? I mean, in any given competition, there is a best, and everyone in the given lower ranks, wants to be that best team. Here's a hint, just because you don't win doesn't mean it's not still fun.

As to the topic of balance which has been thoroughly discussed, I'm going to go devil's advocate on this one. Guess what? All of these teams that say they're 100% student built, designed etc, are not. Who do you think designed everything in the kit of parts? I can pretty much guarantee you it wasn't a high school student. So yes, you have had engineer help. Really, it's not so bad, I promise.

Why would you do it without adult technical mentors? (and btw, in this post, college kids will count as adults, even though some people say that there is still a need for real adults) Well, possibly because you have none available. I know that we looked endlessly for anyone to help mentor our team. We had 1 engineering major in our mentor team last year. The rest just knew from being on their high school teams. I understand that it's not ideal, but sometimes you just can't get adult technical mentors. We've been trying to get into GM (the closest place that would have them) for almost a year now. I'm still waiting to get ahold of anyone inside of the Lansing plant.

Why would you do it? To make things happen with what you have. Sometimes it's just not available. I've had a few people tell me that since I didn't have them that I shouldn't have started a team. I think my kids still had a great time, and want to come back again next year, so I don't see the problem. The kids learned. The mentors learned. Yes, we weren't as good as the best teams, there are only so many "best team" spots available.

Overall point to those that don't want to read the rest of this post's babble: Whether or not your team has the technical mentors, as long as your kids are still inspired by the adult technical mentors of other teams, and get the picture that we're trying to portray in this program, the best that you can to is the best you can do. Do it, and be proud of your results