Are all girl FIRST team counterproductive to the philosophy of FIRST?

[Jon Stratis]

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

Perhaps I didn't make it clear enough... allow me to restate in a clearer manner

My personal opinion...



Yes, I inserted a value judgement, I'm an engineer. I don't see the value of increasing costs for what, in my estimation, is no performance increase in the system. In my experience teams don't exist in vacuums, given X resources if you have 2 teams sharing those resources you are not inspiring MORE people you are inspiring the same number of people (likely less due to the fact that there's a minimum level of competency required and it's easier to reach that with more resources). I just don't see why splitting already scarce resources (mentors) is a good idea for something that a watchful mentor can prevent.

So let's talk resources - Community has a fixed amount of money, what do you think is a better use of it? Running a second team OR attending a second regional? They also have a limited number of mentors each of whom have different teaching styles and skill sets, wouldn't it be better to let students gravitate towards mentors who can inspire them rather than limit them by gender?

Idk, I just don't see the value added by limiting inspiration on a gender divide.

You're making the assumption that the same total number of students that exist between two teams at the same school would join a single team. From my experience, that's simply not true. If you have a single, mixed-gender team, generally speaking fewer girls join, and less of those that join get involved on the technical side of the team.

How else can you explain the vast difference between two relatively competitive schools: A school with 500 students per grade, 40 members on the team and 3 girls, only one of whom works on the robot, versus a school with 80 students per grade, 25 students on the team, all of them girls (real-life example), and over half working on the robot? What is the mixed-gender team doing wrong that they can't recruit girls?

Being guys, it's extremely difficult for us to understand the huge perceived barrier girls face when joining a team. Most of them come in with less related experience (like working with power tools) than guys their age. They're all inundated from birth with societal expectations pushing them towards female stereotypes and away from technical fields. It can be very difficult for some of them to even admit an interest in robotics, for fear of not fitting in with their peer group. Having a local all-girls team, especially one that's established and respected, can go a very long way towards convincing prospective girls that it's really OK to come and play with robots. That's what happened just earlier this week when my team demo'd at another school and recruited two new girls for that school's team! Those two new girls saw that it really was OK to do admit their interest and join the team, despite not having shown any interest to the team's earlier recruiting efforts.