[Ellery]

Well all of you have the right factors which determine the existence of a team.
1) Dedicated people (Engineers/Teachers/etc)
2) Funding (Corporate Sponsors/ Fundraising)
3) Politics

All those go hand in hand. I've been lucky to be on a 10 year team #191 X-Cats which has been part of the Company culture at Xerox. Without those few who have been doing this for years you still need to bring in new blood every year on the mentor side of the team in order to continue the existence. Helps alleviate the burnout problem. Without these dedicated people to fight against the politics and funding within the school and company programs like this would be more of a 1 year experiment unless a structure is formed and a porcess is followed year after year. Keep the leadership team refreshed to keep people interested since new leaders will bring new enthusiasm back to the team.

Definitely with the huge increase in teams the average team life is pretty small.

Ellery - 2002 X-Cat Team Leadership Committee