Class Credit for FIRST

[Marisa A.]

Team 375 has a STEM class in which any member of the team is allowed to join. The only stipulation is that they have ninth period free (as this is the only time the class takes place), and that they are in good standing in their mandatory classes (English, Math, Sciences... etc). While any member is allowed to take this class and it replaces other electives (Unless requested by the student), we try to keep out the mentality of "well I am only going to show up when I can receive credit" by making sure that everyone realizes that they will not be offered the class again if they do not put their full efforts into the team! We can receive up to 8 credits (one for each semester) for this class. We work on robotics projects, as well as other engineering projects our team works on, such as Lemelson-MIT Inventeams. For schools not willing to implement a class, or without the manpower (or other factors), before this class was implemented, our school offered National Honor Society credits for being a participant on our team. (We still have this option, and our head mentor has to certify that you contribute to the team) If your school has an honor society, or letters, see if you can get it established for your team! They may have the equivalent significance that National Honor Society has in our school.