Advice request: traveling for the first time

[EricH]

Phase 1: Check school travel policies regarding transportation. You're looking for information about adults (number, ratio, and qualifications) and transportation methods (i.e., does the school require some particular method for some particular distance). There may also be rooming requirements (I'll get to some of those later).

Work with the school now, they might even help fill out the budget a bit. Do NOT violate school policies--they really don't like that for some reason.


Phase 2: Figure out where you're going. This would pretty much be asking the team "where do we want to travel and who do we want to play?".

Phase 3: Make preliminary arrangements. That is, register for the regional and start hotel/transportation shopping. At this point, you'll need to figure out how many students you can take without violating a school requirement--and how you determine who goes if you have to leave someone behind. Start figuring out payment/fundraising.

And now for some other tips:
--Hotel breakfast is usually a really good thing to have. But look into what that breakfast is: if it's just donuts and coffee, you're going to have a lot of hungry teenagers. (Or hyper teenagers. Whichever is worse...)
--Do some advance research into venue food--it may be worth getting something delivered (or picked up) for the team.
--Speaking of food: Dinner should be planned out somewhat ahead of time. Either have a place to go eat or return to the hotel for pizza.
--If anybody doesn't have contact info for the lead mentor/other key leaders, they need to get it.
--Make sure that everybody is aware of team travel policies like buddy system, curfew, and the like.
--Just to make things easier on the leaders: make sure everybody wears a team shirt on travel days. Much easier to figure out who is in your group and stick together--and if you're missing someone, they should be easy to spot.

[GeeTwo]

Originally Posted by EricH

make sure everybody wears a team shirt on travel days. Much easier to figure out who is in your group and stick together--and if you're missing someone, they should be easy to spot.

Absolutely! Even when we do local demos, team shirts are mandatory. Not only do they stand out for mustering, they present the team as an, er, team. As we now have two uniforms (t-shirts and bowling shirts), we have to make clear which is the "uniform of the day".

[Mr V]

There is no one single best procedure because it varies depending on your district policies and the teams financials.

So #1 is to find out all applicabile district policies.

For example I know of two districts that require the travel to be by district vehicle. One the cost of the bus and the district van that carries the robot and pit supplies is covered by the district and another than charges that takes the money out of the team's school account. Some require that that they make the arrangements and pay for the accommodations but require reimbursement for the costs. Some I know will cover the cost of the Coaches hotel room.

If they will allow transport by private car what are the requirements, background check, finger printing, proof of insurance ect.

Do you have the budget to cover some are all of the cost of the travel? Some teams do cover a portion or all of the travel expenses if the student meets certain requirements. Others require students to pay expenses but have hardship grants available to make certain that the students who cant afford are still able to attend. Note this is usually done as a "see me" and kept 100% private from other students.

Do you have a "Team Mom" or other person who wants to help out but is not an engineering mentor. In my former team before we had a booster club we had a Team Mom who made the arrangements, found and reserved hotel rooms, made sure the drivers met school policies, assigned students to cars, assigned students to chaperones, gathered orders for the boxed lunches, arranged for teams dinners ect. Once we had a booster club the booster club made the arrangements, paid the bills, collected monies ect with the various things being shared by the various members of the booster club leadership.

[penguin4130]

1) What does your team do to prepare for traveling to and from competitions?

2) What are your teams requirements for traveling with the team(if any)?

3) If you have any travel fees - What are they?