getting your team involved with your school

[northendchopper]

you hit the nail on the head with that one. i think every team has a hard time finding dedicated members as well as money (most teams at least)

[northendchopper]

it would be good to see your team at river rage. (battling for the top) and good luck with the striped gear, hope that it dosent happen again

[Jay H 237]

Have you tried approaching school officials about your team becoming part of or affiliated with the school? Also are you looking for/expecting funding for your team from the school board? I don't want to come across as negative (my team also has it's own issues concerning the school) but I included this link http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...t=26255&page=3 because as soon as your team is affiliated with others things can become sour. You must decide how much of an affiliation you want first. To get them involved there are excellent points in some of the previous posts. You may also ask if you could demo the robot at a Board of Ed meeting or invite school officials to YOUR robot meetings. Let them know and possibly see how much goes into building a robot and how much the team means to your members. Make sure they also see not only all the effort that goes into physically building a robot but all the fundraising and PR that also goes with sustaining a team. Don't forget to play footage of actual comps whether your robot is in it or not so they see what the idea of FIRST is.

Good luck,
Jason

[northendchopper]

we are a part of our high school..that is not the problem, we are just trying to get more kids intrested in what we do. I know what you mean however about the sour experiences that can occur. they make things more complicated.

[FadyS.]

Originally Posted by northendchopper

we are a part of our high school..that is not the problem, we are just trying to get more kids intrested in what we do. I know what you mean however about the sour experiences that can occur. they make things more complicated.

I think it all boils down to convincing teachers to convince students that this is a good educational program. Our team is hoping that our situation changes completely once we actually compete and the students and teachers see our robot in action.

[northendchopper]

yes. that is the problem. unless the teacher has been introduced to first, they think of it as a way to get out of school. which is not the case. i do more work at a first comp. than i do during school. getting the teachers involved would really help get students involved

[Jay H 237]

Ok, I misunderstood exactly who you were trying to get involved. Are any of the teachers involved with the team? Have they mentioned the team to thier classes? Does your school have any sort of a technology program/classes? This is an excellent area to talk to students about the team with since it has to do with technology and where you're most likely to find interested students. Computer classes are good too since you may find students interested in programing. The main thing is to get the word out whether you team members talk to the students, the teachers mention it, you demo the robot at lunch, put up posters, distribute fliers about the team and I can go on and on but I think you get the point. Like I said, get the word out and make the team known.

[northendchopper]

we have two teachers that help our team out. but in a school where the students out number the teachers by an extreamly large ammount, two teachers is not alot to spread the word

[Nathan Pell]

While I am glad to read we are not the only team that has issues. I have a few ideas that our team is doing. Last year was our rookie year, with about 5-6 dedicated members, and we knew we could not "take it to the next level" without getting more students involved.

I took students with me to the 10th Grade English teacher in our magnet program. She just happens to do Lego Robotics in her technical writing class. We took the robot down, as well as some students and gave a presentation.

We also put up posters, advertised on the school annoucements, and had a booth at club rush.

To get support from the school, we tood the adivsor to SGA with us to a regional, and now she is hooked. She has a lot of contacts within the school, and really wants to help us out.

We are also hosting a post-season competition this year in November and are donating 20% of our profits to the school for the Principal to use at his discreation.

There is a large amount of PR that has gone to making us grow, but it can be done. I wish everyone a lot of luck in all of their endervars.

[northendchopper]

good idea with the donating money thing...everone loves money, so you would love the person your getting it from

[FadyS.]

Originally Posted by northendchopper

we have two teachers that help our team out. but in a school where the students out number the teachers by an extreamly large ammount, two teachers is not alot to spread the word

I can completely relate to your situation. We have just one teacher dedicated to this program. He teaches senior math and physics courses. He has spoken already to all the math and science teachers about spreading the word but it's only getting to a small number of students. We've spoken to the computer science teachers to get them talking to their teachers about the program as well. Our principal fully supports the program but student and teacher support could've been better. I believe we'll get to more students if we go around the classes and talk to them about robotics. We will probably be targeting the math, science and computer science classes from Grade 9 to Grade 11. Our school doesn't have a machine shop anymore and therefore there haven't been any major tech classes in the last 2 years.

However, this year, we made quite an impression on the parent council and the principal and vice-principals. They are very interested in seeing the program succeed. Next year, we may have a lot of mentors through parents and FIRST alumni. I'm planning on going into software engineering or computer engineering next year but I'm very much interested in coming back after class to mentor as are most of the other grads on the core team. Really, our entire core team is a group of prospective engineering students.

[northendchopper]

our mian mentor teacher physical science and physics. he also tells his classes but we see no result. we have a car class, but i do not believe that the student in that class would be intrested in what we do. i am definitally gonna hafta bring up getting more teachers involved

[Rich Kressly]

small steps and build
ALWAYS say thank you for what you have/get
NEVER speak poorly about what you don't have/get (even though you could)
Involved teachers/staff are a key
presentations
Win an Award? Get yourself on the school board agenda and ask for a moment to thank the school and community for their support.
It's funny, but if you thank them first, support will start to come.
It'll always be slower/less than you want, but keep building positively
Put a promo video together? Give copies to administration and school board members.
After they get an idea, ASK them to be in your promo video and talk about how FIRST has influenced the school and community
Frequent email updates to whole community, school admin and staff, sponsors, etc about the progress of your team - all year round - explain the activities in terms of how they are educationally beneficial ...
mention student names and achievement when it happens ...
keep going
don't stop
Every time you think you have no support send a positive message and tell the whole community and school you couldn't do it without them.

[northendchopper]

great ideas, thank you much, that promo video would be a good way to get teachers not normally involved, involved. I never thought of thanking people in advance. I guess it would make them feel guilty and make them support us more

[RoteAugen]

Originally Posted by Rich Kressly

Every time you think you have no support send a positive message and tell the whole community and school you couldn't do it without them.

are you a politics major?

I should slap myself for not thinking with that lens... especially because I've already started my college education (as a high-school senior) in that major.

but yeah.. our mentors are BAE systems employees, a parent or two, and an editor for Yankee magazine who spend a lot of time helping train the students and help brainstorm ideas for the bot.

we literally get *NO* support from our school, save for the allowance of using the school name to enter the competition.

but who knows? maybe that will change next year since the principal seemed to enjoy watching some matches at the regional. It's really too bad that I won't be around to see it happen... though I probably will become a mentor soon.