Mentor Roles

[rich2202]

Originally Posted by hauki

If the build team is totally getting off track what should be the mentors role?

Depends upon why they are getting off track. One programming mentor believes in letting the kids fail. they learn a lot through their failure. However, he does show them the errors of their way in time to get a functioning robot.

I have been an RI, so I can tell the kids: That is not done properly; That will not pass inspection. Those things they have to fix. Just this week I surveyed the different areas: drive train, shooter, boulder handling, swiss army knife (various mechanisms for defeating defenses), etc. I then asked the Electrical Team what is their plan for wiring all the motors. They were not addressing how many motor controllers they needed (one for each motor), and that they had maxed out the number of high amp slots on the PDP.

We force the kids to prototype. If they can't prove it works in prototype, we don't let them build it.

If you can see the design will not work, try to help them visualize why it will not work. It is still their design, and the earlier they can fix the problem, the easier it is.

It is a big team, and I have no idea who is doing what (I am more on the programming side, so I do not see all the hardware). If they are not addressing issues - Every few meetings (we meet 4 times a week), I ask "how is X <climbing> coming along". If no one is working on it, then it is a warning to them to put some people on it.

I see a Mentor role is to guide. We do not build the robot for them, but we do keep them from going down dead ends that may keep them from a robot that can compete.

[eneubec1]

hauki,
1st.... THANKYOU for volunteering to help. Many of these students don't appreciate the value of having a engineering mentor. Just ask the teams that don't have any engineering mentors and still compete.

This is a perspective from a 3yr old team. It has taken our mentors and students 3 yrs to mature to the point where they have mutual respect for each other. The students really want to learn and do, but they typically struggle with visualizing concepts and deadlines. Adult volunteer's tend to want to "ensure they don't fail", and when they see this, jump in a bit "too much". Refrain from doing this and help them visualize the problem.
Also understand what you as a professional engineer can conceptually understand may take a student 10times as long. Be patient. What would take a mentor 10 minutes to do, take a student much longer until they have gained that experience. They will not gain the experience by watching. Make sure they are hands on "engaging".

We help them realize challenges with their design, and prototyping is very helpful to do this. We have started using legos mindstorm legos this year for "mocks ups" instead of "drawing things". (It was a huge success. in 20 minutes THEY found 3 design problems)

We also have a weekly "mentor only" meeting on monday for an hour. We bring up all sorts of things at this mentor meeting. But the reason for this is to bring the mentors together to manage risk to our team goals, have common mentor goals, and ensure the kids are still having fun.

Hope this helps.

[Al Skierkiewicz]

Every team has different ways to manage their team and most of them work. We believe on WildStang that we are all team members, we all share in failures and success. As lovelj stated above, to let the team fail is not inspiring. A team meeting to discuss progress might show some interesting results. I have seen teams where one student is driving the team and everyone goes along with that student. It is easy for a student to get lost in the forest. However a team discussion might bring everything back into focus and actually get the entire team moving in the direction needed. We meet as a team every night to discuss what we accomplished yesterday, what we need to do today and what tomorrow is likely to bring.
Getting a driving base is a huge accomplishment and it shows the entire team that they can work together to get something to move. Small victories add up over the weeks of the build.