The negative effects of FRC

[Mike Schreiber]

Originally Posted by jijiglobe

To give an example of the amount of work that students on this team do, our CAD team does the entire robot CAD during a CAD marathon the second weekend after kickoff. This year CAD marathon lasted 36 hours with a 2 hour break after hour 20.

Your teams choices of how they manage their time cannot really be blamed on FIRST. This is likely not the most healthy or productive work schedule for students.

Originally Posted by jijiglobe

My experience as president was hugely stressful, and left me in a position where I had to stop and ask myself if it was all worth it. I have to admit that this year, during build season, I wasn't really in a good place emotionally; there were just too many things to worry about, on top of my classwork.

This is a problem with every high school sport - albeit not always to the degree that FIRST pushes some students.

Originally Posted by jijiglobe

On the other hand, I'm worried about the implications of this success. Is it necessary for our leaders to push themselves this hard for our team to be successful?

Depends on your definition of success. If your goal is Einstein every year, then you should look at teams that do that and how they manage their workload and resources.

Originally Posted by jijiglobe

I have met many students (from my own team, as well as others) that let their grades suffer for their team.

Originally Posted by jijiglobe

Of course it's not FIRST's fault that these types of situations arise, however I think it is important that they are talked about, and that FIRST does their best to address these problems.

This should be the student's and the team's problem. Not FIRST's. Think of every football player who got pulled from the starting spot because his grades slipped. This is no different.

Originally Posted by jijiglobe

Finally I would like to talk about competitions. Competitions provide an environment that implicitly encourages unhealthy behavior. Competitions start early, and end late. If you account for a healthy breakfast and dinner, this means that students often get 4-6 hours of sleep on competition nights, when they have to go work themselves to the point of exhaustion. Furthermore, at competitions, I have found it hard to allocate time to eat lunch. Lunch breaks (especially on the day of eliminations) tend to be exceedingly short, and that time is often necessary to systems-check the robot, and make repairs. Taking a lunch break, puts you at a competitive disadvantage, and don't even get me started on Einstein. If your team makes it to Einstein, you don't get a lunch break; You need to haul yourself and your pit over to Einstein field to get ready for opening ceremonies. I'm reluctant to say it, but I think FIRST should close pits during lunch, for the sake of ensuring that students eat.

Agree with what's been said so far with regard to sleep. I get 7 hours of sleep on competition days and I usually go out with the mentors to do non student activities after competition. Yes they are long days. That prepares you for life too, I've had to work worse hours than FIRST competition hours.

Food breaks I agree with you. This was particularly bad at MI State Champs this year. Elims started at 2 and ended at 10 with no dinner break. I agree mentors should make sure students get food - that is one of our responsibilities, but it's tough when they're all in the stands for literally 8 hours.

Originally Posted by jijiglobe

tl;dr:

FIRST places a huge burden on students that can sometimes have negative effects on grades and health. Lunch breaks encourage students to skip meals, and airplanes on Einstein are dangerous

tl;dr
Every sport is tough - so is life.
I like lunch too.
Meh, wear safety glasses.

[Hallry]

Originally Posted by Mike Schreiber

Your teams choices of how they manage their time cannot really be blamed on FIRST. This is likely not the most healthy or productive work schedule for students.

If your goal is Einstein every year, then you should look at teams that do that and how they manage their workload and resources.

Just want to point out that if anyone knows how to manage their time well, it's Mike and Team 67. They meet only 3 times a week during build season - 4pm to 7pm on Tuesdays and Thursdays and 8am to 4pm on Saturdays. And yet look at their consistent robot quality year after year.

[jajabinx124]

Originally Posted by alicen

On a different side of the sleep deprivation - it kind of lends itself to the real world. Sometimes you will have projects at work that cause you to work long hours for deadlines and get little sleep for a few days. Then once your deadlines are hit, you go back to a more normal sleep/work schedule.

So in short, I don't see a few days of exhaustion/sleep deprivation/stressful choices as negative. They are opportunities to learn from the experience so that when you arrive in the real world at a job you are more prepared for what gets thrown your way.

I agree. Sleep deprivation is pretty inevitable in the real world and that's how I took it too.. did I regret every time I woke up during the morning of a competition that I only got 4-6 hours of sleep? Yea, but kinda had no other choice.. especially before Saturday cause of the scouting meet Friday night which tends to take quite a long time.

Originally Posted by Sperkowsky

I now have a rule to eat before alliance selections but whats going to happen when a kid passes out on the field because they had no time for lunch.

I made a rule for myself to eat lunch (or at least some sort of food) before alliance selection (since I was the team rep) after the Lake Superior regional this year. I didn't eat anything but a light breakfast that day, didn't eat lunch, and after the regional was over on the way back I literally crashed on the bus and other team members told me that I was pretty out of it.. ever since then I've been eating lunch at competitions. During 2015 I never ate lunch during the Saturday of the regional and somehow got through it.. TL;DR Food is good, don't skip out.. even if you are nervous about something eat at least something.

[fargus111111111]

I tend to side with most of the other people who have already posted that FIRST, FRC especially, is stressful, but that stress is good. It is through the stress that the competition feel really comes out for me. The level of stress, for me, is what moves FRC beyond the average science fair. Personally, as far as eating is concerned, I always put some snacks in my pocket that I eat between matches in case lunch or dinner winds up being rather late. I do realize that for the drive team especially it is often hard on Saturday to find time for lunch. It is usually our policy that we meet with our alliance at a table in the lobby and one of our team members brings food to the drive team so we can inhale it before matches start. Sleep, as the original post mentions is something that we, myself included, do not get enough of on competition weekends, but something all our mentors stress to us is that they do not want to hear that you are tired and need a nap halfway through the day. They encourage us not to stay up to the wee hours of the morning playing games and we always have an 11:00 curfew, that being said, I often struggle to stay awake on the bus ride home.

I too am a graduating senior and the team's impact on me has been tremendous. I hope that going forward you discuss the issues you found with your mentors because most of the issues you addressed, except the paper airplanes, were matters that 343 talks about at the meeting just before a competition and at the nightly meetings at the competitions and we seem to do a good job of not having a major issue with any of these. I cannot speak for Einstein as we have not been there for several years, but I did notice last year at Championships that the paper airplanes did seem a bit excessive at times. IMO they should set aside a time and place for the planes and ask teams to not throw them outside of that window.

[NShep98]

I won't touch on Champs because I've never been, but for other events my team has a practice where immediately following the last match before lunch/dinner, however short it has been cut, the drive team and ONLY the drive team (with the exception of one or two crucial pit crew members) will go and eat, quickly at that.

Everyone else stays behind until the these people return to make sure the robot is in working shape, then they schedule out their meals however they feel like. I like this system because it gives the drivers a short break while handing over responsibility to those who won't necessarily need to be on/near the field anytime soon. Someone above mentioned the importance of delegation, and this is one example of how that can work.

[MrRoboSteve]

I was overinvolved as a senior in high school. It hurt my grades. It was the right decision for me -- fun to do then, and not a big negative life impact looking back from now. Based on your goals, a different choice might be better for you.

Of course, I did miss a week because of catching Mono. But, hey.

[SpaceBiz]

Originally Posted by fargus111111111

The level of stress, for me, is what moves FRC beyond the average science fair.

The level of stress and pressure along with necessary amount of preparation, strategy, and dedication are what set FRC apart from almost all other non- athletic competitions. This is why Robotics is the only organization in our school where I would compare our team's successes to those of other school sports teams.

[Siri]

Originally Posted by The other Gabe

don't matter how well you plan lunch if it's cancelled due to the event running behind

Planning well doesn't involve relying on the lunch break. This should be better advertised to rookie teams especially, but hopefully most veteran mentors understand how unreliable it is.

Fortunately, even in small (district-size) events, teams don't play every match. There's is always a way to get everyone fed, but you need to prioritize and plan and/or adapt well. I've been pit lead/supervisor and operator/coach simultaneously, as both student and mentor, leading understaffed crews through dozens events ranging from small districts to Einstein and including full elim runs with major lunchtime robot rebuilds. More illustratively, I've been a referee (dual-hatted inspector) at events that don't have a backup ref and cancelled the lunch break. Meaning we literally must be reffing every single match that's played--and we still eat at resets. Don't just give up; it takes teamwork but you can't simply write off teammate health. (This isn't to say I haven't previously written off my own nutrition, sometimes because I was wrong and sometimes because I'd get nauseous.)

Don't trust the lunch break and don't trust the venue guards or food lines or unknown prices. Sometimes lunch/dinner means taking food into venues (which is not always feasible), squirreling it away in robot carts (more foolproof), eating at odd times, and/or darting through labyrinths or out side doors to scarf down food outside of the venue area (very common). Middle-of-nowhere venues often require excellent planning, twenty-minute drives by food runners, or good inter-team cooperation. Sometimes food/hydration just involves asking authorities nicely, and occasionally it even unfortunately reaches the paramedics (especially a problem for hydration). As with eveything it usually involves teamwork and should have contingency plans--this will become unremarkably automatic for your team over time.

I'm not saying FIRST's system is at all perfect, but we can't abdicate responsibly just because there's something to complain about. FIRST is part of real life, particularly when you're dealing with real students' health. We can help FIRST improve the system, but we can't just blame them and wait.

[Chris is me]

On the tangent of lunch during FRC, it's basically impossible to fit it in if you're in the pits. One novel solution that my buddy / Shaker's drive coach Max uses is that Soylent meal replacement drink. He just brings a 12 pack of that stuff to every competition he goes to, and each time he needs a meal, he chugs one. Takes like five seconds to drink and you're back to work, and it's probably of better nutritional value than whatever greasy venue food you'd have to wait in line for 20 minutes to eat anyway. I'm not generally a fan of Soylent but this seems like a really nice application for the product and I'll be investing in a case of the stuff for next season.

[plnyyanks]

Originally Posted by Chris is me

On the tangent of lunch during FRC, it's basically impossible to fit it in if you're in the pits. One novel solution that my buddy / Shaker's drive coach Max uses is that Soylent meal replacement drink. He just brings a 12 pack of that stuff to every competition he goes to, and each time he needs a meal, he chugs one. Takes like five seconds to drink and you're back to work, and it's probably of better nutritional value than whatever greasy venue food you'd have to wait in line for 20 minutes to eat anyway. I'm not generally a fan of Soylent but this seems like a really nice application for the product and I'll be investing in a case of the stuff for next season.

In the fall, I had some unfortunately timed classes that went right through lunchtime, so I gave Soylent (v1.5) a try on the recommendation from a professor of mine whose diet is ~60% Soylent. It's pretty amazing - it basically tastes like pancake batter and then you're no longer hungry. I stopped once those classes ended because I prefer regular food, but it's a pretty cool product. It hadn't occurred to me to use it for FRC, but I think it's an awesome application, especially for those who wouldn't eat otherwise.

[TheModMaster8]

A system were you have 1 or 2 co leaders supervised by a captain takes the load and distributes it a lot,You as a individual must weigh the importance of both homework and FIRST, I personally chose FIRST and would do so every time. Their comes a point when you must ask for help, you are on a TEAM! not a solo mission. Be proud, you and your team got placed in the top 16 teams in the world! hard work will normally payoff and it did in your case

[caume]

The lunch thing is huge. Every competition I've been to in my 3 years, I've been in the pits nearly the entire time. I'm the drive train operator, so I am constantly in-between running the robot and fixing the robot. There is simply no time to eat. At a competition where we got into eliminations, I almost passed out because I was unable to get food. The entry guards were very picky about people bringing in food, so I couldn't get anything except a $10 hot dog. I weighed myself before and after the competition, and there was a 10lb difference. I am already nearly underweight, so that was bad.

Lunch breaks need to actually be lunch breaks, and students/mentors/everyone should be able to get food that has a realistic price.

[Fusion_Clint]

Ensuring the drive team/pit crew get something to eat is the lead mentor's responsibility. How they do it is up to them, but they have to make sure that they are hydrated and feed.

[dmaggio744]

Im incredibly glad this was brought up, and completely agree with the lunch situation.

FIRST participants usually exude enthusiasm about their hard work, but rarely talk about where to draw the line between sacrificing time to enjoy doing FRC, and FRC not allowing them to have time to enjoy. During build season, grades, extracurricular involvement, and even health(both mental AND physical) take their toll on both students and adults.

[The other Gabe]

Originally Posted by Fusion_Clint

Ensuring the drive team/pit crew get something to eat is the lead mentor's responsibility. How they do it is up to them, but they have to make sure that they are hydrated and feed.

don't matter how well you plan lunch if it's cancelled due to the event running behind