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Re: Elite (invite only) FIRST teams
Craig,
There's a bunch of stuff necessary to your plan that you haven't elaborated on, which you'll have to get going week 1 of your fall freshman semester:
1. convincing a school or group to start the team - especially difficult in an area where there aren't already FIRST teams, and no one's been to a competition
2. funding from said school or group, industry sponsors, and the like.
3. finding meeting space, build space, tools, parts, practice space.
4. finding other mentors (how many people did you envision on your review board?)
5. convincing parents to get involved
6. getting transportation to meetings, for students from other schools or if meeting space isn't on school grounds
7. managing transportation, lodging, meals, and chaperones for the trip to competition (our closest regional is 4+ hours away, in another state - it's a three day trip). Each state has laws about adults traveling with minors not related to them.
That's all I could think of in about two minutes.
My point is, if you're the one starting this team, then all the above administrative tasks are your responsibility before you even think about getting close to the robot. You might think you can farm them out, you may even get people who say they're going to do it, but you can't count on it. You've got to be prepared to do any administrative task that needs to be done.
What worries me is that your plan seems to be based on pure optimism. Have you started up a club before? Folks on this message board are here because they're already excited about FIRST, and know what it's about, so we don't need convincing how great a program it is. That's not true of most of the population - they haven't heard, and they need convincing. How thoroughly have you thought through your contingencies? What happens if there aren't as many students as you hoped, or their skill sets don't quite cover all the bases? How about if they don't get along with each other? Are you the right guy to step in and mediate? Can you settle disputes without having one of the parties get mad and quit? What gets your priority when your time is tight - your coursework or the kids?
Think it through. Be prepared to deviate from your original plan. Good luck.
- Steve
Last edited by SteveJanesch : 24-03-2008 at 15:45.
Reason: clarified priority near the end, there
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