New Team in India?

[Akash Rastogi]

Originally Posted by SteveGPage

A couple of years ago I tried to start one in Delhi through a public school, that was sponsored by a local education company (I was their US employee/consultant). I had even talked to Dean Kamen about this. He was very interested in getting FIRST into India, and had some thoughts about how to go about doing this. He understood the issues with schools and getting mentors. Send me a PM and I will see if I can get some talks started with the company I used to work with, and get you hooked up with them! I am still very interested in making this happen and will help in any way I can!

Steve

Steve the problem with public schools in India (even in the most developed parts) is that they lack a lot of funding themselves. Solanki and I talked about having the team affiliated through IIT (India's top engineering school) which his dad is an alumnus of. Potential sponsors include his dad's company, IIT Delhi, TATA Motors, as well as Microsoft India. Solanki also attends the American Embassy School so hopefully it goes over better there.

A huge issue that Solanki and I discussed is that students in India are largely already overwhelmed with school work (no this is not a stereotype, it is very true) and so far only 5 students have claimed interest in joining in on this opportunity. Hopefully we can think of ways to get more kids involved though. Mentors and resources should not be too big of an issue though.

Akash

.