College Students: How is your experience in FIRST?

[ngreen]

I guess I give it my best shot Ken.

So far I've have mentored my hometown team on the weekends. Home is two hours away or I'd help more often. This has probably been good for my schoolwork because I would be there to often if I was closer, and had a car.
I probably averaged 8 hours of work a day when I was home.

I'm at Kansas State and the closest other team is at least an hour and a half away so I have no one close to mentor. I thought about starting a team here but decided to at least wait a year and probably should wait until I have a vehicle.

Kansas City will be having a regional next year so I am hoping to be able to help there. And it will be easier to create more teams in our state. I am setting a booth about FIRST up for my colleges open house where hopefully I will be able to spark some interest.

As far as competition this year I have watched 3 1/2 competitions. VCU, Portland, and part of UCF webcast and then went to help teammates scout at SLR. I won't be able to travel with my team to LSR, open house weekend and calc test, but will be a championship to at the least cheer my team on.

A team could be led by a college student but it would be very hard. I think it is nice to have teachers and engineers leading the team for certain reasons. The studies part wouldn't be a problem. It would just take some self-discipline and a little caffeine.

Teachers and professionals are way better with dealing with school administration, securing funding, and a lot of the important parts of starting and maintaining the team.

Right now I'm addicted and excited. Between watching the finals from the different regionals this years game is awesome and I really can't wait to go to Atlanta.

I would like to get more into the volunteering and mentoring aspect of FIRST but I haven't found a good way to tackle it. Between time, nearness of events, having no car, and serious lack of funding I've had trouble this year. Any insight on this would be great. How did you start volunteering and mentoring once becoming a college student? Especially for people that aren't close to an event, SLR is the closest at seven hours away.