Why do teams voluntarily do FIRST without adult technical mentors?

[phrontist]

The fact that thread is still raging speaks volumes. Obviously, there is a serious rift in the F.I.R.S.T. community. It seems (to me) to break down in to two real stances pragmatically, regardless of which of the (numerous) supporting rationales are being used:

1. It is acceptable and commendable for teams to feild a robot that is, in part or in whole, designed by non-student team members.
2. F.I.R.S.T. robots should be designed by students, with non-students in supporting roles that are not-directly involved in design.

Questions of manufacturing are a whole other debate (is buying sub-assembiles from AndyMark kosher?) and should remain seperate from this issue. In my view what it comes down to is the balance between "inspiration" and "recognition". So there are two questions here:

1. Does allowing engineers to design FIRST robots further the goal of inspiring students to pursue Math/Science/Engineering careers?
2. Does allowing engineers to design FIRST robots further the goal of recognizing student accomplishments in the engineering challenge that is FIRST?

I think the former question is debatable, students being corrected by engineers or observing the thought process of engineers as they engineer solutions to these (fairly easy) problems is arguably more or less inspiring then allowing students to do it alone (with engineers providing lessons at a higher level, or not at all). But I can see no argument in the latter question! How can you recognize students for the performance of a robot they were only paritally responsible for? It robs non-engineer teams of any sort of fair competition. How can I be expected to beat out a professional engineers robot (I still intend to, mind you )? Should a debatable vehicle for inspiration come at the price of recognition?

Working as an intern in what is now our primary sponsor has given me the chance to work closely with engineers, having my designs critiqued because I (as a mere high-school student) cannot be unsupervised in implementing production code. No doubt, this is a valuable experience. But working on my team, which has no engineering mentors, has been an equally valuable experience in an entirely different way. The team sinks or swims based on how well the students work together and know their stuff. I derive a great deal of pride whenever our team wins, because it really is us, the students, winning. Our (non-engineering) mentors are fantastic, plying us with sage wisdom and keeping us organized to some extent, but I'm glad it stops there. Our mentors are there to bounce ideas off of, not to dictate designs from on high.

Some have advocated that each team should be allowed to run things as they wish. I feel that sort of liberty should always be strived for. However the pro-engineer design teams limit the freedom of the opposing camp by altering the nature of the competition. You simply cannot have a fair competition of student wits with engineer designed robots on the feild. FIRST needs engineers, not engineer designed robots.

Originally Posted by Alexander McGee

The program is not intended to be a high school event. It is intended to be a partnership between students and adults.

It's the nature of that partnership that is all important, and to my knowledge, unspecified by FIRST. If it is, I'd love to hear it, but that doesn't mean there isn't room for change. FIRST is it's participants, and should change as the people change.