Mentoring Question

[jgerstein]

We've had great technical mentors with a wide range of backgrounds. We've had some great engineers work with the team. We've also had a handyman, a variety of parents who build things in their garage for fun, and even a parent with no technical background who hung around the build team so much she accidentally learned to build robots.

With that said, I absolutely welcome mentors who want to come in and help on the technical side without prior experience. Personally, my expectation would be that I (and other mentors) would help them, but they'd have to be responsible for taking the initiative to learn new things.

[DonRotolo]

Yes, absolutely, provided that mentor recognized their need to learn more, and was willing to do so. At first I might assign an advanced student to show them the ropes, then another adult to sharpen it up.

Unlike typical high school, FIRST teaches using adult methods. Some children may not learn as effectively this way. but high school and older adults certainly would.

And you never have enough help.