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Posted by Splash.

Student on team #53, Team Inferno, from Eleanor Roosevelt High School and NASA GSFC.

Posted on 7/12/2000 6:18 PM MST


In Reply to: OSMTech Needs Written Support!! posted by Becky Sherman on 7/11/2000 9:16 AM MST:



The first year I worked on a robot, I was unhappy when I spent practically everyday working on a robot I thought was competitive, only to see that it was nothing compared to the teams that ovbiously have their engineers build their entire robot. When the engineer's make all the parts and the students just bolt them on, I don't consider that students working on the robot. Some teams openly admit that their sponsor builds the entire robot. And I can think of one team that is in the elimination rounds every year, that complained when their sponsor took a week longer than they had said to build their robot.

I don't see the problem with building your own robot. If you actually helped out on the robot last year, you should have learned enough to be a successful team next year. Dependency on engineers shows a lack of confidence in your own team. And if you're concerned with parts, you can pay a company to machine them for you.

If the engineers can show you that you can do what they're doing, than they have inspired you. You can sit and watch Michael Jordan highlights and be inspired, but that's not going to make you a basketball player. Sitting around and watching your engineers build a robot is not going to make you into an engineer.

I would have liked NASA to build our robot last year and all the years before, but they didn't. I am more motivated being to be an engineer by working on a robot myself, than the students who sat around and didn't help.

So then, what exactly is your problem with not having engineering support?