Why do teams voluntarily do FIRST without adult technical mentors?

[Lisa Perez]

I think we all concur that mentors do indeed have a key role in the 'I' of FIRST. If a team does not have the resources for whatever reason, however, the students are not necessarily not being inspired. Rather, I think that such a situation would inspire the students - simply in a different manner than would be expected. When they do research on a drive train or form of appendage or approach a corporation on their own (to name a couple of examples), they are - in my opinion - inspiring themselves to persevere, to be innovative, to recognize their own talents.

Nonetheless, we must find it integral to recognize help where help is offered. When I was a sophomore on my team, we took pride in having a 100% student-built robot (a few negatives for this have been mentioned throughout the thread) - but that is definitely not to say that we did not accept aid from our mentors. Our mentors were the ones to teach us the concepts of physics during the design process. They offered us tips on what appendages might work, all while stressing the importance of simplicity and allowing us to select what we thought would work most efficiently. Our mentors taught us how to use the machine tools. In essence, they empowered us by giving us the knowledge necessary to build a robot and have a successful team. Did they touch the robot? No. But did they inspire us? Most definitely.

I had been given the opportunity to see the contrast between the different types of teams as a student who had been on two teams. I must say that I found inspiration in both types, and while the kinds of inspiration differed, the point is that the 'I' was indeed existent.