Before I discuss any particular issue I want to say thank you to Jay for bringing this topic up.
I will admit, I don't listen to Dean Kamen's speeches 100% of the time. Not sure why but I do distinctly recall him saying a couple (thousand) times that there needs to be an FRC team in every school. For the first time in several years I finally heard him talk about sustainability last year. Now, maybe I am just an ignorant fool but this seems to imply that FIRST would prefer to lower the quality of the program for an increase in quantity. This scares me. I am hoping I am wrong and would LOVE for someone to show me I am.
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Originally Posted by GaryVoshol
I think part of the problem is that we can't predict which teams will succeed without first allowing them to fail.
Three examples of recent rookies in Michigan that have succeeded immensely, by whatever measures you choose to use: 2337, 2834, 2771. These teams hit the road running and never looked back, and there are others like them all around the country and world.
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I'm gonna have to disagree with you Gary, we can predict what teams will succeed with some accuracy. While it won't be 100% we can usually tell if a team is going to be sustainable by how it goes about finding help. I can't speak specifically for 2834 and 2771 but I can tell you that 2337 has some serious FRC experience in its mentor force. Not only that but they have community and parental support. All too often people will view money as the main resource an FRC team needs. People look at me like I am crazy when I say that I can always find money but it is true, money is a very widely available resource if you are willing to work hard and be creative. Engineers are in much higher demand. Skilled engineers who are also effective mentors are rarer still. Community support is another major hurdle that many teams neglect. I recall 3 years ago when 2337 was first starting up a call for mentors went out through my company for help because one of the employees thought that someone there might be interested in getting involved. Before they even existed 2337 was searching for the help it needed. Additionally 2337 networked with teams in the area. They don't have the tool they need? Maybe 397 does, or 494, or 68, or 27... Obviously, I am quite familiar with 2337's story but I am sure that 2834 and 2771 share similar stories.
I guess I will just put a short list of things that imho a team requires to be sustainable:
1) Mentors (NEMO and Engineering, NEMO being most important)
2) Community Support
3) Network of regional FRC teams
4) Sponsors/Money
These don't assure success but they can't hurt. And yes, they are in order of importance.
What concerns me more, and these may be selfish concerns, is the death of old teams. How many teams are no longer with us or are no longer competing at a level accurate to their history? Those teams that are dying that slow painful death despite the best efforts of their mentors? To me it evokes images of the decay and ruin of Detroit, once majestic but now just sad to look at.