[artdutra04]

Originally Posted by ebarker

The 5B doesn't bother me so much as how US Dept of Ed says how to spend it.

It is such a long long way from the bureaucracy that administers the money to the classroom. When you read some of these documents you begin to wonder if the administrators in Washington and the classroom teachers even speak the same language and live on the same planet.

If you go read the Ed.gov documents you always see a lot about 'programs that target x and y'. So after a lot of work a school district design a plan, pursues a grant to do 'x' or 'y', then does the plan, then does a ton of assessment and send the answers back to get put in the wooden crate next to the other wooden crates you see in the movies. And then whatever they did probably doesn't get replicated anywhere else.

They are funding a search for solutions. We have a solution in hand but without funding. As a politician told me recently - "this is the biggest no-brainer in the history of earth".

This is why I certainly hope that Obama makes good on his promise to bring the government into the Web 2.0 generation with increased transparency. Simply putting all declassified records online in the public domain an accessible manner would be a great asset to this country, both to see existing progress and to hold elected officials accountable.

But even without this new transparency, if there are great ideas that get forgotten in wooden creates, then shame on us, the constituents. We all vote the elected officials into their positions, and we all have a responsibility to make sure they are looking out for our interests, whether it's at the voting box, writing letters to our politicians, going door-to-door, connecting and discussing matters with family, friends, and neighbors, organizing rallies or protests, or just making sure our voices are heard.

As soon as we let our cynicism of the ability of the our government to do anything right overtake our motivation to make our government better, that's when it actually will do nothing right. But if we are both optimistic and motivated, then anything is possible. Three years ago, Obama was an incredibly long-shot contender for President, simply because most people back then weren't expecting such a huge number of optimistic, motivated people coming together and backing him.

If we as a community can really rally behind a clear and concise set of goals, then I see no problems in securing funding for FIRST from the government. But right now, neither Dean nor FIRST have given teams clear and concise goals on what they believe should be the optimal role of our government in FIRST. Instead, teams everywhere are doing disparate campaigns in their local regions, to limited success. If we want true success, we need a national campaign.

To really put the FIRST community on the right track, Dean needs to do the equivalent of Obama's health care speech before Congress earlier this month. It needs to be powerful, it needs to be emotional, it needs to be motivational, and it needs to set clear and concise goals of what constitutes success. Maybe it even means Woodie would be the one to give such a speech, as he's a much better orator.

FIRST has been working on their alumni database, now's the time to use it. Start sending our emails at least once every week or two to everyone. (Don't worry too much that an email a week is too much, as the ones who are too bothered by receiving an email asking for help every week or two probably couldn't be bothered to actually help at all). Ask them for a donation, ask them for support, and nurture a positive relationship between the community at large and the goals of the organization. Organize rallies, in highly visible places. Get local teams to bring their robots to the State House, with everyone wearing their team tee-shirts and bringing rally signs.

The scale of these rallies needs to be big, much bigger than currently. And the only way this will work is if the really gung-ho teams get their other local teams to participate as well. Having one team do all the public relations work for FIRST in a region will help them personally fill their trophy case with EI or CA trophies, but it doesn't help the FIRST community in general as much as having all teams contribute more. A large number of moderately enthusiastic voices are much more effective at swaying opinion than a small but highly vocal minority.

These rallies and public events need to start everywhere, because it takes a lot of "infrastructure" to really pull off a successful national rally in Washington. It takes a lot of connections, it takes a lot of people, it takes a lot of confidence that these people actually will show up. The last one is the most crucial, with the only way of having genuine confidence being positive track records that speak for themselves.

For if FIRST doesn't start "getting" this soon, I fear their ambitious plans for a national march in Washington in time for their 20th anniversary in 2011 will be but a fraction of the success they could have been, had there been a much more rigorous grassroots effort behind it. So I'd seriously suggest they carefully examine and learn from the 2008 Obama campaign for their public relations and grassroots efforts. Keep it positive, keep it motivated, and gently but forcibly hold people's feet to the fire by telling them that if this is what they genuinely believe in, then need to show it, and they need to act.