Quote:
Originally Posted by David Brinza
I know a team that has 100% student turnover each year: Team 1717. Their FRC team is composed of seniors only!
Each year, the Dos Pueblos Engineering Academy accepts 32 students who enter as freshmen and, after three years of rigorous courses, become students of the FIRST Robotics Class (ROP). D'Penguineers deliver incredible robots and have some of the most knowledgeable and capable students you will find in FRC. Visit them at Championship: this year they won the Los Angeles Regional and Engineering Inspiration Award.
Perhaps this isn't the right model for most FRC teams, but it shows what is possible with well-prepared students.
I'd like to hear more from some 1717 students and alumni about their FRC experience!
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David is exactly right; The DP Engineering Academy is actually a part of Dos Pueblos High School (opposed to an entirely independent academy. Members are regular students at the high school who, every year, take a course or two on engineering, physics and computer science and then senior year the whole program culminates in the participation of FIRST.
We clearly have issues with senior turnover, the goal of the program is to give as many people as possible a chance at robotics. Is it hard this way? Yes. But because of this, in four years we have 128 people going through the program who have all had their own build seasons and gone to their own competitions.
We definitely try to prepare the younger classes for robotics though. The program would be lost without the amazing instruction of our director (Amir Abo-Shaeer) and the mentors. We also encourage the freshmen through junior classes to go and watch at the competitions and they are consistently being updated on how the build-season is going.
Because we have an entire new class every year we run the risk of having a really good robot one year, and then the next year lack computer programming or electrical skills, for example, and not doing as well.... but so far the program has worked out great.