QotW 08-31-03: Making the cut.

[Madison]

This week, I'd like to rescue and rekindle an interesting debate that was a bit off-topic for the thread that it originally appeared in.

Some teams are open enrollment and will let any student join and participate to their ability. Some teams maintain criteria for membership that may involve fundraising success, academic performance or hours committed. Others allow a small number of students to participate and rely on a process of applications, interviews, and decision-making to select those students from among many applicants.

Question of the Week 08-31-03: Should FIRST and FIRST teams encourage active processes that cater this program to certain groups of people? Are membership applications and minimum grade point average requirements necessary?; beneficial?; right?

If you believe that FIRST and FIRST teams should actively pursue engaging specific groups of people, which groups? Why? Should the academic elite be given priority, or is it better to limit team registration to minorities and women?

I am not satisfied with the answers I received (or, more appropriately, did not receive) in the aforementioned thread and I believe that a good look at the original purpose of FIRST, how it's grown, changed, and adapted -- if it has -- and how we feel about that is necessary and rewarding.

I understand that teams all do things different ways, so I want to ask, respectfully, that you each be intelligent, thoughtful, and thorough in your arguments so as to ensure that people do not misperceive the posts as hurtful or malignant. Thanks.