Becoming Competitive

[TheBaconWiz]

I understand what situation you're in. My team is home school based, and we were also founded in 2008. Because we aren't connected to any school or organization we rely heavily on our sponsors. We also do demos and SOS which is a day when we teach kids from kindergarten to 5th grade about science. It's one of the best ways to gain publicity too. We scout out potential sponsors and hold banquets and give presentations on why it would be good to sponsor a team like ours and how we help the community. I don't see any reason why you would need to keep a team small on purpose, however I don't know all of the details. I would recommend convincing as many people to join as possible, even if they don't find robots interesting. We have some people on our team who just want the experience of things like chairman's or helping in the community. I would really just look for people and convince them to join. A diverse team is usually a better way to get new ideas and connect with people. One of the only ways my team can gain sponsors is by meeting with them through connections people on the team have. FIRST is about learning before anything else. Just keep that in mind and try to do the best you can!