Large amount of team members.

[Libby K]

I'll come here and share a story of my own - 1923 will be learning how to expand along with some of the others in this thread.

We've had some pretty explosive team growth over the past few years.

In our 9-season history, this has been our progression:

2006: 4
2007: 9
2008: 11
2009: 24
2010: 35
2011: 58
2012: 75
2013: 87
2014: 104
For 2015 (our 10th season! eek!) we had 170 students sign up as interested.

Now, that doesn't mean we'll get 170 - we'll probably settle out somewhere in the 120-range. When a student pays their $200 fee, signs their copy of the handbook agreement - then they're a team member. 104 last year for FRC was a struggle, and the mentors felt like we weren't engaging everyone to their full potential.

In order to handle all of these students, we'll be having an FTC team, the FRC team, and (we're in the process of forming) a VRC team as well, all for the 2014-15 school year.

Our plan is that FTC is available to 7th, 8th, and 9th graders in our community who want to take that next step up from our FLL JumpStart program. The VRC team will be for younger high school students, or upperclassmen who don't quite have the hours and weeks of time to commit to FRC build. Our FRC team will be for the experienced builders, the kids who are willing to go all-in on their time for the team.

All teams will operate with their own subteams just as FRC does. We encourage students to spend time with all the programs. However, our rule is, if you've made a commitment for FTC or VRC, you don't get to skip it just because you want to show up at FRC build.

I, truthfully, have NO idea how this is going to turn out. It'll be a learning experience for us as a team.

Karthik answered the question of ideal team size in his Simbot Seminar last night (hilariously, asked by one of 1923's FRC students I noticed was watching.) His answer? Set goals for your team, and if you can accomplish them with the size team you have, then it works.

So that's where we are right now. Setting goals for each team, and for our program as a whole, and seeing if we can make them happen.

All I know so far is that 170 is a scary, scary number.