How do you organize your team?

[dubious elise]

I'm happy beyond belief that someone started this thread, thank you so much NoodleKnight for bringing this to light. After having over a dozen very commited, highly motivated seniors graduate last year, we began passing out applications like mad. We began accepting kids and, quite quickly, our team jumped up to 45 kids (in a school of 1500, i suppose thats fairly selective, considering that we had about 30 returning members) However, many of these students are underclassmen and we too have been having a heck of a time trying to stress the importance of attendance at meetings and workshops and assistance in fundraising.

What we have done so far is made an attendance chart for "pre-build-season" meetings to see just how many kids are committed to a relatively short information meeting every monday after school. From here, we usually can determine at a glance which students, unless excused, are really noncommittal. We also keep a less formal tally of fundraising work and volunteer work. Finally, to figure out who will get to attend the kickoff, a worksheet composed of various questions from usfirst.org, chiefdelphi.com, and our own website must be turned in to our team leader one month before the kickoff.

Sadly, we have the same 10-12 student posse that dutifully shows up for everything. We have made it known that kids who do not assist with these pre-season activites will not have an open shot at going to a regional (or if possible, national) event.

Obviously, dealing with team dynamics is always tricky. Be persistent, be firm, and be sure that you can demonstrate to your team the vast rewards of participating in FIRST. Best of luck to y'all!