What does your school think of robotics?

[BaldwinNYRookie]

O yeah, and I don't believe wrestling or football will get you even the slightest chance of leaving the state much less ATLANTA!!! I remember a time when being in the chess club meant you were a nerd, those days are long gone thanks to FIRST.

[Sam Lipscomb]

Originally Posted by MikeWasHere05

Sadly, our school still considers us a club. But I have yet to see one of our sports teams be the #8 seed in an international competition.

haha yea, our football team was a state champion, but i don't see -them- going to atlanta and winning there!

[tiffany34990]

our school district reconizes the program but doesn't support it that much
as long as we fund ourselves and pay attention to rules and reg. we are okay

at my school, SFHS, our principle thinks it's pretty great. she always tries to come on saturday of ucf to see a few matches.

for fellow students...they think it's cool..consider us a bit nerdy but that's okay...we are all proud to be in s.p.a.m.

[EricH]

For those of you who think you have it rough, meet the (gasp) homeschoolers. At least two teams are pretty much all homeschoolers (1315 & 330). Homeschoolers have to: 1) rustle up funding from wherever they can find it and
2) Find a place to build.
On the other hand, you know most of the people in your group, at least by sight and name, and they know you, so you don't have to put up with the nerd and geek stuff as much. Unless you're already one.
It's also a little easier in the recruiting department, though not much. Administration? Parents of the students, for the most part. They leave us alone or help out.

[Crash&Burn]

wow, first off, let me say, I believe the correct term for the robotics race is 'NERD'. There is a grand difference between the word 'geek' and 'nerd'. If you've ever seen Revenge of the Nerds you'd know what I was talking about.

I'd have to say, seldom, if ever, is the team acknowledged by the general population of my school.
But, when teacher and peers ask me why I miss so much school, and my reply is 'Robotics'... the concensus is usually positive. "oooh thats nice" or "hmm, so, is that, like, a new club"

My friends laugh at me and just tell me to join the cheerleading squad.

[deathbycornchip]

there is a kid in ne of my classes that says he could esaly lift the tetra on to the top gol (he is 4'10") and thinks he could build a robot by him selff (he gets D's and down on his grades so he is not to bright)

[EricH]

Originally Posted by deathbycornchip

there is a kid in ne of my classes that says he could esaly lift the tetra on to the top gol (he is 4'10") and thinks he could build a robot by him selff (he gets D's and down on his grades so he is not to bright)

Show him a tetra. If he can lift it, show him a center goal if one is available. Have him try to place a tetra. (He probably can. If he were 3'...)
As for the building a robot by himself... Ask him if he means LEGO Mindstorms or a competition robot. If he says a competition robot, ask him how long it would take. If he says less than six weeks, get him aluminum, motors and hardware. Give him a challenge and say, "have this done in six weeks." If he succeeds, put him on the team.

[vijay24]

They may call us geeks and nerds, but deep down under that prejudice they know they want to be the hard-core, sleep-deprived, hand drill-toting, robot builders we know we are! (woot)

[Kashi Chan]

Originally Posted by geeknerd99

Hmm... I usually get something like, "Cool! You guys build battlebots or something?" from the general public, "Robotics is eating you alive!" from my friends, and "How's the autonomous code coming along?" from teammates.

haha thats so our school too cepts its why isnt this working? go check the programming! when its CLEARLY a mechanical problem *cough cough* jk jk hehe

[Koko Ed]

My wife had told me once one of her students commented that the team was just another way to "seperate the smart kids from the regular kids". What a sad statement and I hope the acception not the rule because we don't only take IB students on the team but the so-called "regular kids" from jocks to kids strgulling to get by in school (though they are required to show improvment if they are to stay on). FIRST should never be looked upon as some sort of adversary but an opportunity.

[Winged Wonder]

Our team is made up of two different schools (rival schools i might add) Cocoa Beach and Rockledge. The first time i walked into the cafeteria at Rockledge High, i saw two beautiful trophy cases just covered in PINK with trophies, pompoms all that wonderful stuff from our team... and was immidiately jealous. my school (cocoa beach) barely acknowledges our existance, and it seriously makes me mad. Cocoa Beach students make up about half of the team this year, and we barely get recognized. just this year before UCF we had a "Pink Day" for everyone to show spirit... about a grand total of 3 people remembered who werent on the team. it was seriously pathetic. We have a few teachers who are really into it which i have been begging to get to actually help out with the team because Cocoa Beach does not have any teacher mentors, and the librarians love us to death which is nice, but its not good enough. even if we dye our hair for spirit at competitions PINK, we have to dye it back before we go back to school if we dont want to get suspended for having "distracting hair". we had a student last year from rockledge who had no trouble having her hair flaming Hot Pink, but even with pink streaks, we'll get yelled at. (i know i'll feel the heat when i get back from nationals this year, but its worth the risk in my eyes) We couldnt show a promotional video for robotics because our principal was very concervative and didnt like how there was video of girls running around in pink body paint with bikini tops on (we later went through the video frame by frame and found that there was no such footage... ) My school is comprised of a great deal of IB students, so robotics kids arent really labled Nerds or Geeks, but i doubt we'd care since we sport pink "Nerdstock 2k5" shirts at school and competition alike, and i personally have a pink armband that says "I <3 NERDS". i seriously wish my school would show more support. we have this thing called "Pizza and Sodies" when someone/some people do something well extracurricularly, they get pizza and soda on friday for a small "congratulations". when we came back from the UCF regional, our win was not announced to the school (and if i was i did not hear it), the only thing i saw was a slide or two on the rolling announcements that no one ever really looks at. we never really got congratulated on a grand level... and when before i left, people were saying "good luck you guys, i hope you win this year" i was about to scream "we win something every year!" but thats not exactly gracious professionalism and it makes me seem arrogant and i dont like that. but the fact remains that people dont really hear about us at our own school, despite how well we've done in consecutive years for 8 years in a row.

i dont know.. i'm sorry for this really long Rant... just my two cents and a little vent in my frustration... but for those of you who really have supportive schools, i'm happy for you. you guys are really lucky.

[Sunjit]

our school suports robotics alot, You will be able to tell cuz we brought 700 pple to gtr regional last year and we will be doing the same this year.

were lucky to have all the suport, principle is also in love with robotics

[KORN_lover_2007]

Originally Posted by Jill1022

Everyone I ask to join says, "Oh I can't do that, i'm not smart." How do you guys get the word out that Robotics is fun, no matter if you can progam a robot or not?

Yeah, I get that a lot too. At the beginning of the year I asked a bunch of my friends to join, and that's exactly what they said. But now that I've explained to them all the things they could do in robotics, I think a lot more may be trying to join next year.
With the students at our school, a bunch of them have no idea what robotics is. Well, they may have a smidgeon of an idea from the school paper, but I don't think they really get it. The teachers give us a lot of support though. I think all the kids who are on the team have a bunch of their friends on the team too, so we all kind of hang out with each other all the time. Although, we do get called nerds at school, but it's always in a joking manner. We call each other nerds all the time too, but we all know we love each other. Even if we weren't friends to begin with, we ended up becoming friends from spending so much time together for robotics.

[DarkJedi613]

Well...a lot of the teachers are interested when I tell them, but not much more so then like "what is it? how did you do?" The administration is interested, but not a huge supporter. They do fund us however and allow us a room in the school.

I'm not sure how many kids know we have a robotics team - not that many I think. Or if they do a lot think they can't do it. Which is unfortanate cause we could always use more kids.

[Jill1022]

Originally Posted by KORN_lover_2007

We call each other nerds all the time too, but we all know we love each other. Even if we weren't friends to begin with, we ended up becoming friends from spending so much time together for robotics.

Yeah, usually when we get called nerds and geeks it's not in a very serious way. And some of us are so cool that it makes robotics a bit cool too.