Meetings

[Siri]

I think the main difference here is that FRC only has 6 weeks and requires a lot more fabrication, because it's not all/any kit parts. We meet essentially every day for 6 weeks, though we give most of the team gets the first few Tuesdays/Fridays off. (CADers gotta CAD.) I logged over 230 hours on-site in 6 weeks. And I go to school 3.5 hours away from that site. Throughout competition season, we're still meeting 3-7 times a week.

If we made all the meetings we need mandatory, we'd have 1 mentor and no students. Our meetings are all optional (except for initial orientation/safety, etc) and students+families decide their commitment. You get out what you put in, but right now we don't have any set standards. Some teams do--requiring minimums for travel, etc. Other posts will likely cover this, but team handbooks are also helpful.

You'll notice that this also contributes to FRC hours being much less evenly divided. Core people, especially designers log a lot of time (~400hrs). Head mentors (often also CADers) log even more. As in, upwards of 500 hours more.

[548swimmer]

The time commitment is another good point. I personally logged over 200 hours of fabrication/assembly, and upwards of 300 in CAD/design.

Not to mention that FRC consumes you, and for 6 weeks it will be all you can think about.

[Grim Tuesday]

Our team has meetings once a week (tuesday after school) off season, and on season, we have build sessions from 5-9 (everyone stays at the library and does homework between 3:30 when school lets out and then). People are logged as having hours, and the lowest X amount that we can't fit onto the bus flat out can't go, though we do try to let everyone attend at least one regional.

[thefro526]

We only have 2 or 3 'mandatory' meetings during build. The first meeting is Kick-Off and the Second and Third are brainstorming.

Other than that, we don't force anyone to show up. To be considered for the Championship a student needs to log at least 2 build sessions a week out of a total of 10 to 11 sessions.

Usually, this leads to a core group of students that know the robot inside and out, and a lot of less involved members that still can say they 'worked' on the robot.

We're hoping to change this in the coming season, by switching up some build methods and finding more things for people to do. We'll see if it works.

[superbotman]

At the begining of the year our mentor tells the team, "The world belongs to those who shows up". Then he lets people decide if they want to come or not, no team meeting is mandatory for everyone. However, the less you show up, the worse your chances of being on the team the following year are. Meetings about competitions and important events are mandatory if you want to attend the event.

[Chris is me]

Kickoff is mandatory for the team, as are officer elections and occasional meetings in the fall. I don't think we've had an instance of someone not showing up to mandatory meetings and still demanding to travel.

We try to bring anyone we can to competitions, because we've found it takes one competition to really inspire students into putting extraordinary effort into the team. They really seem to bring the best out of students. While some slow starters may not be of the best benefit to the team initially, the team exists to help students, not just the other way around.

[Ian Curtis]

Originally Posted by 548swimmer

The time commitment is another good point. I personally logged over 200 hours of fabrication/assembly, and upwards of 300 in CAD/design.

Not to mention that FRC consumes you, and for 6 weeks it will be all you can think about.

My TI-83+ tells me this translates to 11+ hours of FIRST a day. I'm all for commitment, and I'm sure there is an exaggeration factor here, but this is definitely unhealthy. Take a break.