[mtaman02]

As far as recruiting is concerned NO one team should wait up until graduation day to realize that you went from 25+ members down to a handfall and possibly even less than that if you only count those in which are truly dedicated. It's always good to keep the recruiting of members alive by making constant announcements at the beginning of the day that the team is looking for students to come and join the team. You should be able to get at least a new face or two on a daily basis.

I am kinda interested in the 70 hour rule you guys have and would like to know about it. If its what I think it is and I'm not to sure about it maybe you guys should try chopping the 70 hour rule down to maybe 48 hours instead.

Fundraising is always a must. No one team can honestly go off and compete off of sponsorship alone. Unless its a really big named company / organization. Sponsorship is not always dependable so whatever fundraising that gets done will help and fill in the gaps the sponsorship missed.

Myself coming and graduating from a team of maybe a dozen kids as well as a team with very little funding from sponsorhip; I can understand and sympathize for your team. It feels horrible to be the smallest and underfunded team in FIRST, But guess what with the little bit you have you can come a long way from having nothing at all. I wouldn't go behind my mentors back and doing something they said can't be done however I would continue to rub hope in their faces and continue to tell them that there are other options.

While I won't be too detailed as to where I came from since many of the local members on CD (local in my area anyways) know me, My old team had about 15 participating students on a yearly basis. 6 - 8 of which were extremely dedicated. We managed to build a name for ourselves and made ourselves known to FIRST in every way a large team could. We built extremely robust robots with little to no funding, thanks to the mentors who had much knowledge of what they were doing. The 15 of us that went to competitions cheered louder than the larger teams competing. And if you were to walk in the school and look at the awards cabinet you will notice that with as many students on the team participating and with as much funding we stuggled with on getting we have become one of the many success stories of FIRST. A Team with nothing - No funding - No membership have won close to or above 30 awards most of which came from the regionals and championship and the few from off-season competitions all awards ranging from Quality to Team Spirit to Event Winning. Even with nothing you can be successful, You 6 students and that teacher should have another meeting and re-discuss what could be done to keep the team alive. Boxing up the shop would be one option I wouldn't accept. All you need at that drivers station is 2 drivers a human player and a mentor a total 4 members from the team. I say you guys can do it. All you need is funding. Theres plenty of time to register your team and elect your first Regional. Remember the deadline is in December and Kickoff is in January.

If you guys need help there are plenty of teams in this organization that will be more then glad to help you guys with whatever your needs are.

We are a family and family members help one another.