[Tom Line]

I think teams have a bit of a different opinion on what exactly defines sustainability.

While I've argued against unchecked growth in the past, I've also questioned my beliefs on the issue and come up with some questions that I can't satisfactorily answer.

I think people need to ask themselves: do I believe it's FIRST's responsibility to partially finance teams? In general I'd argue pretty heavily against it. However, when most people say that FIRST needs to help teams be more sustainable, they mean that FIRST needs to either support the teams financially or to lower the entry costs (which amount to the same thing).

That is the crux of the argument for me right now. FIRST offers enough incentives to join the program. If the learning and real world experience isn't enough, and the excitement and competition isn't enough, the scholarships and friendships certainly should be.

FIRST promotes sustainability by sustaining themselves - the parent organization. If someone can suggest a way to promote sustainability among teams that doesn't require FIRST to hand out more money in some way, then I suspect they'd jump onboard.

When FIRST says they want a team in every school, they mean it. If they had funding to make that happen overnight they would. They don't, so it's up to teams to do it themselves. I can't think of any other sport where the parent organization funds the teams. Even in highschool sports, the schools end up financially supporting the parent body, not the other way around.