Keeping in Touch & Remaining "Relevant"

[VexisDarksteele]

Hello, CD.

This is a thread for those of you who may have experience with long-distance mentoring, or who may have fallen out of the FIRST community for a while only to try and "catch up" when you decided to come back.

As a dedicated founder and alumni of our team, I really want to continue to help out the current and future students... The problem? I'm 5.5 hours away. The only times I get to physically visit the team are during my university's breaks, and on rare occasion, at competitions. And on those visits, I don't feel like I'm much of a help; I'm more of a guest celebrity appearance for the students who still recognize me than a mentor. We've discussed things like video chat as a potential workaround that would enable me to be there throughout the season, though that has yet to be enacted. All that leaves me with is email and Google applications like Drive, where I can edit and comment the Chairman's documents in real time with them. Other than that, I don't have much opportunity for interaction.

Additionally, I sometimes feel as though I have nothing left to contribute for them -- seeing how prepared, how on top of things these students are, it seems like they're already far better at Chairman's and marketing than I ever was. I couldn't possibly be more proud of how the team has done these past few years, and the level of student talent blows my mind. But it also creates this need for me to remain relevant if I wish to mentor, this need to find something that I can still give helpful input on, and I'm having a really hard time with that. Perhaps this is how old computers feel once they've been replaced with a newer model, eh?

It's for these very reasons that I decided not to renew my mentor status on TIMS this season; it just doesn't feel right wearing that title when I barely do anything to earn it. My fear, though, is that once I am graduated and able to mentor full-time, I'll have been out of the FRC community for long enough that I'll no longer be current on how everything works anymore. Updates are constantly being made to rules and award submission procedures. I think it will be difficult to get re-acquainted with it all, which is precisely why I'm trying (unsuccessfully) to remain submerged all along. It's just hard when you have 3/4 of a state separating you from your team.

So, question time:

If you've ever mentored long-distance, how did you remain in contact with your team? How successful were you?

If you were uninvolved with FIRST for an extended period of time and eventually came back, how difficult was it to get back into the swing of things? How did you remain current on all the changes made?

Have you ever felt that you have nothing else you can possibly teach/guide the team? How did you deal with it? How did you keep your fields of expertise relevant?

[GeeTwo]

None of the regular mentors of 3946 was ever on an FRC team, but we bring our varied experiences from the workplace to the table. Already having FRC experience on top of whatever college courses and work experience you accumulate, you it would be a rare team on which you would not be a useful mentor. When your life puts you in range of an FRC team, with a schedule that allows you to make enough time to mentor, let me misquote a song lyric:

Originally Posted by Bob Seger

Come back baby, [FRC] never forgets.

[Christopher149]

We live a few hours west of you in Houghton, and we have a couple former Flying Toasters who may feel like you do (Pat Humfleet and Aaron [somelastname]). I can't directly answer any of your questions (having never left 857), but have you done any mentoring with 1596, 4392, 5714, or any other team near Sault Ste. Marie?

I assume you're an LSSU student? The large majority of the mentors of 857, 2586, and 5486 are Michigan Tech students, so it's very possible to mentor a local team in college (Pat and Aaron are helping us with Chairman's this year). If you feel 3641 doesn't need Chairman's help, 1596 probably could.

Will you volunteer this weekend at the FLL tournament at LSSU or the FTC event in Petoskey? The FRC event in Escanaba in March? The rumored 2nd FRC event in the UP which may well be in the Soo?

[VexisDarksteele]

Originally Posted by Christopher149

We live a few hours west of you in Houghton, and we have a couple former Flying Toasters who may feel like you do (Pat Humfleet and Aaron [somelastname]). I can't directly answer any of your questions (having never left 857), but have you done any mentoring with 1596, 4392, 5714, or any other team near Sault Ste. Marie?

I assume you're an LSSU student? The large majority of the mentors of 857, 2586, and 5486 are Michigan Tech students, so it's very possible to mentor a local team in college (Pat and Aaron are helping us with Chairman's this year). If you feel 3641 doesn't need Chairman's help, 1596 probably could.

Will you volunteer this weekend at the FLL tournament at LSSU or the FTC event in Petoskey? The FRC event in Escanaba in March? The rumored 2nd FRC event in the UP which may well be in the Soo?

Patrick and Aaron were both on the team while I was there; Patrick was one of my two presentation partners for Chairman's, and he was also my VP while I was president of the team. It's good to hear that even Aaron is with you guys now.

Yes, I am an LSSU student. I have tried to reach out to 1596 the past couple of years in the hopes that I could help them, but they informed me that they already have too many college mentors and are not planning on pursuing Chairman's anytime soon. Otherwise, I would have been mentoring them ever since I came here.

Unfortunately, I discovered too late that I was available on the day of the FLL tournament; I would have volunteered if I'd known it would take place earlier in the day (I'm busy on Saturday evening). Now all of the positions are filled. I don't know anything about FTC, as I was never involved in any other FIRST program prior to FRC. I wouldn't want to work a game I'm not familiar with. I probably will volunteer at Escanaba -- I may even be able to convince a few other classmates of mine who are alumni of other teams to accompany me as well. I did not know that there were rumors of an event in the Soo, but I would definitely volunteer at that one if such an event were to happen.

[Kevin Leonard]

I totally get this thread. <3

I was a student on 20 during a major transformation in team culture and I was a part of two of 20's most successful seasons ever. I left the team, and came back over winter break and at competitions to help. What I found is I could still help the team during build season with prototyping and design, but students and mentors have filled in my shoes for much of the area I once occupied- and that's a good thing. I still help 20 when I can when I'm around, and I talk to many people who attend meetings on a daily basis about different things on the team.

I compensated for 20 not needing me as much by finding another team to work with as well that's (slightly) closer to me. 5254 needs my help much more because they have so few students, so I help them more often and in a more involved manner than my help with 20.

[Brian Maher]

Originally Posted by Kevin Leonard

I compensated for 20 not needing me as much by finding another team to work with as well that's (slightly) closer to me. 5254 needs my help much more because they have so few students, so I help them more often and in a more involved manner than my help with 20.

This has been my strategy. While I haven't been graduated for as long as some of you, I've experienced the same feelings. Being 3 hours away from FRC 1257, I have started working with FRC 2791, which is a mere fifteen minute drive. They have a couple niches where a mentor with my skillset fits in well.

In addition, I've maintained a presence on my high school team's Slack channels, where most digital team discussions happen. I respond to questions and offer guidance when needed. It's a nice way to help out over the distance, though it wouldn't work if 1257 didn't use Slack to begin with.

[stormthief248]

Hi Kerry!

Since I know you talked with the Instigators previously, I only have two recommendations.
First, look into what events you can volunteer for, like everyone else said, since I know it would be great to have you at Escanaba, plus anyone one you can bring along.
The second is to look into forming a club or school organization for FIRST alumni or robot enthusiasts. We created one at Tech, where we coordinate mentors for the 3 area teams, and we created a collegiate team for MRDC for those that want to do more or do not wish to mentor. The club can be used to coordinate mentors for FTC or FLL as well, depending on what's started in the area. It can be whatever people want it to be.

Sidenote: I volunteered as a judge for FLL this year. Never had to learn the game for my role. Even if you don't know the specific game, you can find ways to volunteer.

Patrick

[Max Boord]

Exactly how I ended up mentoring a team in Hollywood, Florida 3 and a half hours away while also mentoring a team in central Florida is one for a different thread, It has given me some experience mentoring a team too far for me to go down and visit frequently.

Originally Posted by VexisDarksteele

If you've ever mentored long-distance, how did you remain in contact with your team? How successful were you?

In the case of 4592 I joined knowing my greatest help would be to streamline processes and provide educational resources as there main problem preventing success was a simple lack of direction and mistrust in common FIRST practices. It turned out the team already had a system for mentors to Skype into build meetings making it easy for me to teach CAD and communicate frequently enough that I would be considered part of the team and prevent the "celebrity appearance" problem that can arise when mentors rarely appear in build meetings.

Also, I found that being available via text message can be of huge help. For instance, when the mechanical team was unsure how to measure the relative success or failure of various bin grabber prototypes, it was relatively easy for me to explain that they needed to create an excel spreadsheet, do some time trials and, using excel's tools, figure out which ones where the fastest/ most consistent.

Originally Posted by VexisDarksteele

How did you keep your fields of expertise relevant?

By finding ways to implement my areas of expertise into areas that I are not an expert in. In my case, only the programmers had ever used excel before while myself as a strategist and engineering major use it constantly. So when the mechanical team (possibly my weakest area of expertise) had a problem I tried to apply a solution that not only familiarized them with a tool they will likely use in the future but also allowed me to learn a little more mechanical design/ iteration by looking at what worked and what didn't.

Originally Posted by VexisDarksteele

My fear, though, is that once I am graduated and able to mentor full-time, I'll have been out of the FRC community for long enough that I'll no longer be current on how everything works anymore.

Mentoring multiple teams could be an answer to this problem. There will always be rookie teams whom where ineligible to submit for awards in there previous year and less experienced teams who don't even know where to start when it comes to award presentation and submission. When I started mentoring 4592 basic concepts like iterating a design, match playbooks and consistency over features seamed completely foreign while on 1065 these things are done without even thinking about them since both our teacher and lead mentor have well over 10 years of first experience each.

Originally Posted by VexisDarksteele

All that leaves me with is email and Google applications like Drive, where I can edit and comment the Chairman's documents in real time with them. Other than that, I don't have much opportunity for interaction.

Sounds helpful to me. Especially if no other mentors are available or the students want to work on it with a mentor while not at the build space. As for methods of communication, figure out what the students naturally use and go to that system. Ive spent more time on facebook talking to students about how to design gearboxes and edit promotional videos than just about anything else.

Originally Posted by VexisDarksteele

how difficult was it to get back into the swing of things? How did you remain current on all the changes made?

As notorious as it is for things like FRC confessions, Twitter is actually really good for this. I've used it to do everything from contacting teams I had an interest in mentoring to seeing what happened during demos and multi team practice sessions that i couldn't attend.

[Jessi Kaestle]

Originally Posted by VexisDarksteele

So, question time:

If you were uninvolved with FIRST for an extended period of time and eventually came back, how difficult was it to get back into the swing of things? How did you remain current on all the changes made?

In college, after a failed attempt to mentor a team freshman year*, I chose to stay involved by volunteering at events. Depending on the position you sign up for you are still very much in touch with the rules of the game and what did/didn’t change. This allowed me to stay involved without letting my studies fail* or being a “fly-by mentor”

*College is harder than High School, and at least for me I found that there was not enough me to do it all. The end result was that instead of my studies taking a priority and FIRST going on the back burner, the opposite happened and my studies we’re negatively affected by my FIRST involvement. This is just what happened to me, I am not trying to open the can of worms that is “should college students mentor”.

[Chris is me]

Don't mentor your old team long distance in college. It really doesn't work out well. It's hard enough to be a college student mentor for your former team when you're still local - your peers and former mentors will subconsciously treat you like a big student and it's just really hard to pivot roles like that in the same environment. Add distance to the equation and all of that is even harder.

Come back and visit, help them out how you can when you can, sure, but if you want to keep mentoring in FIRST in college, do it locally. You learn the most from the second team you join, just because you're exposed to another way to run an FRC team. You'd be surprised how radical the differences can be!

As for staying relevant, you already have to re-learn so much when you join a new team, that catching up on what's changed in FIRST shouldn't be too hard to incorporate into the learning process. Ease yourself in to a new environment, read the new rulebooks when you come back, take your time getting back into the swing of things, and you'll be back up to speed fairly quickly.