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Re: Sub Contracted ?
Posted by Ron Hartman.
Coach on team #79, The Navigators, from Eastlake High School and Explorers Post 991 and Honeywell. Posted on 3/20/2000 8:09 PM MST In Reply to: Re: Sub Contracted ? posted by John on 3/20/2000 7:03 PM MST: John, I think you're being a bit harsh on Mike and the Delphi team. I've been involved with FIRST competitions for 3 years now and have had the pleasure to compete against and *alongside* Team #47. Few teams, in my opinion, better exemplify what FIRST is about than Chief Delphi. The idea is to inspire students, expose them to science and technology, make a difference in their lives, and eventually, little by little, make a difference in our society. The competition is the means, not the ends. It peaks the students interest and keeps them motivated and interested. The real measure of a team is not how well they do ON the field at the competitions, but OFF the field BEFORE and AFTER the competition. So what if Delphi has more financial backing than other teams? So what if they have 'expert engineers' (aren't ALL engineers 'experts'???), so what if they fabricate pieces of their robot in outside shops? What difference does that make? Does it give them an unfair advantage? No way. If it did, perhaps they would be National Champions every year. As project leader on Team 79, I feel we are very generously funded, have some fantastically gifted engineers and technicians working the project and have the fortune to work with some very bright and talented students. We, like Delphi, sometimes send work to outside shops, sometimes for free, sometime for money, when our internal time/resources are exhausted. I doubt you'll hear anybody complaining about *our* unfair advantage this year. Fact is, as far as our robot goes, we're probably only in the middle of the pack this year. It takes a heck of lot more than funding, 'expert engineers' (I’m still chuckling over that one!), and “connections” to build a successful robot. It takes even MORE to build a successful TEAM. Delphi has both and I applaud them for their extraordinary efforts. When this year’s competition concludes at Epcot it’s very likely that we will not be the last robot standing (and perhaps not Team 47, or 16, or Heatwave, or some of the other outstanding robots out there), but guess what? When I go home, I can say with all confidence that we’ve made a positive impact on our students lives. I hope you can say the same thing. And by the way, the fact that your team made it to the finals, but only spent a fraction of what you *think* Team 47 invested, is partly why this whole project works so well. Good luck to all and let’s not forget what FIRST is REALLY about. Ron : Basically, what I got out of your last post was the kids told you what they wanted the robot to do, then Delphi, using what it seemed to be infinite pocketbook (around a few hundred grand), and its expert engineers (which specialized in the field) AND Delphi’s connections made the robot work. I can't see how it was entirely necessary investing so much money into the project, seems how we made it to the finals using only a fraction of that amount. : I heard you guys have another Chief Delphi robot with more advanced and revised systems you are planning to use at the Nationals, rather than the one you used at the Jersey Competition. Well, if that’s true, I can’t see it being very fair. Perhaps you can clarify that for me. : I'd also like to know if the students actually played a key role in the construction of the robot, or if their hands on experience was more revolved around assembling the Chief Delphi after all the major components had been built. |
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