The Triplet Challenge

[pakrat]

I have to agree with stephen on this one you guys. Think about it for at least 5 minutes, and really think.

What i came up with is a worst/best case scenario:

Single Team with no collaboration:
Worst : NO students inspired or learning
Bad: Few students inspired and learning
Good: All students actively learning and being inspired to do great things by mentors, themselves, and other teams and companies.

Multiple teams with collaboration:
Worst : NO students inspired or learning
Bad: Few students inspired and learning
Good: All students actively learning and being inspired to do great things by mentors, themselves, and other teams and companies.


But the difference was: when there are more students total, then it is more likely that x number of kids will become inspired. Plus, giving kids a chance at first and a chance at inspiration is more than worth it to me.

So the way I interpret the challenge is this:
FInd some kids, show them the robot. Get them to understand how cool this stuff can be and begin to inspire. Once things are looking good, try to help them start a rookie team. Offer them straegies for brainstorming, work strategies, and whatever else they may need (including but not limited to funding, workspace, travel, registration). Help them to design their own robot if they want. If they aren't comfortable with that, Offer them your robot design. Have them manufacture things if possible, but i guess you can make it for them if they can't. Bottom line, do everything to get those kids and hopefully some potential sponsors excited about FIRST and about engineering.

I personally don;t have a strong opinion about the ethics or whatever else behind collaboration, but I'm never going to do anything that keeps me from inspiring my peers or students next year when i become a mentor, and I hope that many of you feel the same way.

-Rich Ross

[Jack Jones]

I traded homework assignments for honey-doos a long time ago - thank you.

But all on my own I'll go you one better and suggest one big collaboration. That is, instead of the sponsor's dollars/loonies and manpower going to a team or three, it all goes into a general fund. Share and share alike.

Hum, sometimes when an idea gets taken to the extreme it stops looking so good. They tried something like that in the Soviet Union - on a much bigger scale mind you, but it didn't work out.

So, we have to ask ourselves just where to draw the line on collaboration. In my opinion, we've already crossed it.

[rourke]

I want to keep this thread on point. This is about growth. Period.

My “challenge” seeks to steer collaboration AWAY from all of the controversial aspects, and to focus it towards GROWTH (less controversial). For instance…..

• I only support collaboration when without it there would be no second or third team.
• My vision and application of collaboration is “participative”. Students that want to be involved in the design phase have the opportunity – they work hand-in-hand with the multi-school design team. Students that want to build parts get to – they work side-by-side building parts or make their own. Students that want to write programs get the chance to load their code into the robot and test it out. No one gets hand-outs. No one gets short changed.
• My vision of collaboration does not have super teams wiping out smaller teams, or hundreds of robots all looking identical. If it is used for growth, then this is of no concern. Be responsible with it. Use GP as a sense check.

As Karthik mentioned, we are continuing to use collaboration as a growth strategy in Niagara, by adding a 4th team to the region. They are NOT copying The Triplets. But, they are copying a U.S. team’s robot. The students want to compete in off-season competitions and want the confidence in a proven design the first time. Next year they will build their own unique robot from scratch – because of this initial confidence builder. They would not have signed up to do this without it. It was really easy to convince them to jump on board and start spending money when they knew they had the ability to copy something that worked.

There is a win-win here for both the “For” and “Against” Collaboration Camps. Keep the good aspects, toss out the bad. Focus it on growth only. I believe FIRST can grow faster with it, than without it.

[Bongle]

Originally Posted by pakrat

Single Team with no collaboration:
Worst : NO students inspired or learning
Bad: Few students inspired and learning
Good: All students actively learning and being inspired to do great things by mentors, themselves, and other teams and companies.

Multiple teams with collaboration:
Worst : NO students inspired or learning
Bad: Few students inspired and learning
Good: All students actively learning and being inspired to do great things by mentors, themselves, and other teams and companies

One more:

Three teams with light collaboration:
Worst : NO students inspired or learning
Bad: Few students inspired and learning
Good: Three seperate robots created, and all three teams learn the pros and cons of all their designs. A wider variety of skills are needed and learned among the teams that are helping each other. All students included are exposed to three times as many design problems and solutions. Information sharing among teams allow all 3 teams to learn about and suggest solutions to problems that other teams are having.

It's not complete collaboration or complete isolation, as many posts in this thread has shown. There is probably an optimum point in between those where more people get inspired, more problems are solved, and a greater variety of robots are created.

Personally, I think full out copy-collaboration isn't great. The 'virtual team' idea seems much better as far as starting teams. You get the same increase in your team size for designing or building, the same inspiration for other schools and liklihood they'll start the next year, and the same sharing/critiquing of designs. The participants in the virtual team will come out knowing all the pitfalls of the design/build period, and has none of the bad aspects of copy-collaboration.

[Joel Glidden]

Originally Posted by rourke

... Keep the good aspects, toss out the bad. Focus it on growth only. I believe FIRST can grow faster with it, than without it.

I don't understand how you're tossing out the bad. Regardless of -why- a team choses to enter into a manufacturing alliance, doing so provides a competitive advantage, especially if the members of that manufacturing alliance attend the same regionals or are in the same division at the championship. There are many teams for whom such manufacturing alliances are not possible. There are also teams for whom manufacturing alliances are undesirable despite the competitive advantage they provide. My belief is that FIRST's tolerance and encouragement of manufacturing alliances is driving mentors away.

I can't explain my point of view more clearly than I did two years ago when this issue first flared up. So, I'll just link it

Originally Posted by Me

My personal motivation for volunteering in FIRST is twofold. I strongly agree with the ideals and high level objectives of FIRST. I go to bed at night feeling good about having done something positive and contributing to my community. But, when I go in early, stay late, design, strategize, motivate, and pour my sweat and blood into a robot, I do it because I want to do whatever I can to help my team win.

[KenWittlief]

Stephen,

I think the spirit and intent of this thread, to start new teams and make it as easy as possible for them, is excellent.

The thing that seems to be getting people fur ruffled is the idea of giving the new team a robot design.

...Offer to have the new team copy everything you are doing next year. Everything...

this goes back to the root of all the philisophical debate here on CD: are we here to get teams to a regional to play robot games, or are we here to show HS students what its like to be an engineer or scientist?

If FIRST is all about robot games then, ok - give then a starter robot, give them someone elses robot so they can compete.

If FIRST is all about the engineering experience, then give them everything else they need to get started, but make them go through the process of designing as much of the robot as they can, themselves.

We already have a default robot in the KOP that can be assembled in about two weekends - it would be easy for a team with 5 students and one adult mentor to assemble the KOP drivetrain, hook up the control system and battery, and you have a basic moving robot platform that can play defense - and you can bolt on other stuff to play offense, add sensors, get fancy with the SW, modify the wheels.... take it in whatever direction you think you can pull off by ship date.

For most students FIRST is the hardest thing they ever do in HS. I think that is a large part of its appeal. If you make it too easy they will not really be engaged by it, and that hook is lost.

For everything else, make it easy: Money, mentors, facilities, spare parts, tools, computers, money, playfield access, shared travel, money - I agree, collaborate on all the rest.

[Jherbie53]

Originally Posted by rourke

• I only support collaboration when without it there would be no second or third team.
• My vision and application of collaboration is “participative”. Students that want to be involved in the design phase have the opportunity – they work hand-in-hand with the multi-school design team. Students that want to build parts get to – they work side-by-side building parts or make their own. Students that want to write programs get the chance to load their code into the robot and test it out. No one gets hand-outs. No one gets short changed.
• My vision of collaboration does not have super teams wiping out smaller teams, or hundreds of robots all looking identical. If it is used for growth, then this is of no concern. Be responsible with it. Use GP as a sense check.

Having the students do as much of the work is really what I want. Tooting my own teams horn, we always try and have the students do as much of the work as they can. This gives them confidence and lets them know that they have a part in building the robot. It also lets them know that they can go out and do whatever they want. From designing buildings to making nanotechnology to whatever interests them. This is the goal of FIRST, to give high school students the inspiration to go do anything they want.

[rourke]

Originally Posted by KenWittlief

Stephen,

I think the spirit and intent of this thread, to start new teams and make it as easy as possible for them, is excellent.

The thing that seems to be getting people fur ruffled is the idea of giving the new team a robot design.



this goes back to the root of all the philisophical debate here on CD: are we here to get teams to a regional to play robot games, or are we here to show HS students what its like to be an engineer or scientist?

If FIRST is all about robot games then, ok - give then a starter robot, give them someone elses robot so they can compete.

If FIRST is all about the engineering experience, then give them everything else they need to get started, but make them go through the process of designing as much of the robot as they can, themselves.

Ken,
You don't lose out in seeing what engineering is all about. Product design is not the only engineering game in town. In my work, we manufacture the Corvette Engine. We don’t design the Corvette Engine, but we collaborate with the engineers that do. We manufacture copies of the design hundreds of times each day, and do a darn good job of engineering the manufacturing system. That doesn’t stop us from having a pretty inspired workforce and engineering team. This is one exciting product we're involved in. Zero to 60 m.p.h. in under 4 seconds! Yee-haw!!! And you can get pretty fired up about designing and improving the manufacturing system that makes these powerhouses at the highest quality, lowest cost possible. Creativity and engineering doesn’t just exist in product design -- it exists in the whole value stream. Inspiration is created by a vision and is reinforced with success.

[rourke]

Keep on track here. Collaborate for growth.

If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always gotten. FIRST’s growth may flatten out into 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10.....

I’m suggesting we change the shape of the curve to: 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256.....

Here is FIRST’s growth percentages taken from their 2005 Annual Report:

1996 – 59% more teams than previous year
1997 – 61%
1998 – 32%
1999 – 36%
2000 – 38%
2001 – 38%
2002 – 25 %
2003 – 22%
2004 – 18%
2005 – 7%
(and I understand 2006 is around 5%)

Must change the inflection of the curve!!!

[GaryVoshol]

I read Karthik's explanation of the Triplet Philosophy in an earlier thread, and have to say that I am cautiously supportive of it.

I would encourage anyone entering into such an agreement to do so with an exit strategy in mind from the beginning. One long-term commitment would be to invite students from a school without a team to join your team the first year. Collaborate as two separate teams the second year or maybe third year. Then split apart with separate designs, but share resouces (such as machining) when needed.

It must always be a collaboration though, not a "here's your robot, insert Tab A in to Slot B, have fun driving" thing.

[JVN]

Short & Sweet:
I think collaboration is a good thing, and I hope lots of teams take Steve's challenge.

I predict 1114 will have us all amazed with the success of this experiment, and will have a Chairman’s Award within 4 years.



(For those who care about my opinion),
Here is a longer philosophical analysis:
There are many ways to form collaborations. We have seen several different collaborative examples within FIRST already and there are many more out there. For discussion purposes, I will divide these methods into two major categories:

• Collaboration to Grow FIRST (Start New Teams)
• Collaboration to Sustain FIRST (Sustain & Improve Veteran Teams)

The triplet model falls heavily into the first category. A successful veteran team spreads itself thin, and in the process helps start one (or more) rookie teams. These rookie teams get to (ideally) play at the same level as the successful veteran team almost immediately. This success then helps them build into a sustainable program.

Now I’m going to say something that may be unpopular:
Teams that perform well on the field are more sustainable than ones that do not. A rookie that is “competitive” (insert whatever definition you’d like, but the one I’m thinking of involves some success on the field) stands a better chance of coming back than one that doesn’t. This does not just apply to rookie teams (which is something I will discuss below). This is not a universal, but it is true MOST of the time.

There are many people, who will disagree with the above paragraph, and many would accuse me of being out of line for saying it, but based on my experiences it is all true. “Winning cures all” – This can be very true. Sponsors, school administration, community members, everyone likes to see a team with a chance to win gold. Everyone likes telling the story about coming out there and playing hard, and having a shot at winning. No one talks about the team that doesn’t move.

The triplet model gives teams the “taste of success”, and also gives them hands on experience with some proven methods. They fly up through the learning curve, and within a few years, are ready to become a separate, self-sustaining program.

Now, how much collaborative-meddling-involvement is required?
This depends on the situation. In some cases, it requires no more than quick phone call every few weeks. In others, it requires you hold their hand through every step of the process, and/or build identical robots. This is the way of life; every situation is different, and every situation requires a different way of doing things. This is not black & white, as many people seem to think it is.

Some will argue that you could choose a more hands-off approach if you will accept a less competitive showing from your rookie. This is probably true, but why would you? A FIRST team does not need to learn for itself how to be successful. This Darwinian approach to survival is dangerous, and the attrition is killing teams. Let’s face it, there are a LOT of teams that couldn’t figure out how to be successful, and didn’t last in this program. What if we could save them? Collaborative support could have kept them around. Again, the amount of support is not black & white.

So now we’ve got teams collaborating, and spawning new super-teams, who will eventually grow-up and spawn their own super-teams. This is good (will anyone argue that more good teams is a bad thing?). Now how do we save the veteran teams?

Let’s talk about Division by Chicken.
This was an alliance formed between two veteran teams (217 & 229). Why did these teams form this alliance? For 3 main reasons:

• Enhance & Sustain both teams through the use of resource sharing.
• Provide the unique long-distance collaborative opportunity for students on both teams to experience.
• So Paul and John could have fun working together.

Both teams participated (equally!), both teams benefited, all students benefited. These veteran teams came together and became stronger from collaboration. Both teams did well, and both teams had fun with the partnership (and the mentors on these teams, had a LOT of fun). Some may argue the point, but I think THIS is a good thing. This is an example of the second type of collaboration. (Remember when I divided it up, waaaaay up at the top of this post?)

This is not the only example of this type of partnership; this is merely the one I’m most familiar with (obviously). Another famous example is 254+60 in 2004 (there are many others).

How much collaboration is required in this type of example? Do the robots need to be identical? No. Teams can collaborate on something as small as a gearbox or something as small as a motor-mount. Again, this is not black and white, there is an entire spectrum of collaborative involvement, any amount of which can be used to help a team; depending on the particular situation.

Now, there is one major catch here. 90% of arguments against collaboration come down to one thing. It needs to be done right, to be effective. How is collaboration done effectively? I think this is a topic for another time, I’ve been rambling for long enough. If there is demand, maybe I'll help put together a "collaboration methodology" paper.

Based on the potential to GROW, and SUSTAIN this wonderful program, not to mention the unique and beneficial experiences it can provide a team, I believe collaboration is a good thing, and I hope you will feel the same way.

$.02
-JV

[Ian Curtis]

Originally Posted by rourke

1996 – 59% more teams than previous year
1997 – 61%
1998 – 32%
1999 – 36%
2000 – 38%
2001 – 38%
2002 – 25 %
2003 – 22%
2004 – 18%
2005 – 7%
(and I understand 2006 is around 5%)

The growth rate from 2005 to 2006 is slightly over 10%. In 2005 there were 1024 teams, there are now 1133. Not where we'd like it to be, but better than 5%.

[Kims Robot]

I've been watching this thread for a while, really trying to figure out how to add to this conversation without detracting from the initial idea of starting teams.

I would rather see a veteran team donate one of its senior mentors, college students, or anyone close enough to running the team, to run the rookie team, and let them do it for themselves. I've been through three rookie years now... and the rookie year is the most precious. Its the first year your team really sees the game, its when the amazing enlightenement occurs. I would propose to give them a leader rather than a robot design. Most teams dont want to give up their mentors. I get this... but if you are serious about the growth, let them catch the bug for themselves. I will be sad the day that a rookie team that was lead through everything wins the Championship Rookie All Star. We cherish that award, and its because our team did it all for themselves. Did they have my help? of course! Did they have my past experience? Definitely! Did we get help from teams like 229 & 191? Of course! Did they attempt things no other rookies had? Yup. Did they have a team design a robot for them? No.

Ok, so going back to Steve's point that you should do it where no team would exist or no team would have the courage to pursue/continue FIRST. I would argue that given a good leader, ANY team can succeed in FIRST. Look at all the teams that are starting to spring up from FIRST veterans. They all work, they all have courage, they all attempt FIRST, possibly without design experience.

This year, we adopted a team that lost its sponsor and dropped out of FIRST. We let their students continue with us, and next year, we are helping them start their old team back up. We have already agreed the robots will be completely different, but we will help eachother everywhere else we can.

I really thought the idea of the triplets was cool when I first saw it... but now that I see it popping up more and more, I have my doubts. The dependency scares me. I can see teams sharing designs in the offseason, maybe even building new robots from old designs for offseason competitions... but let the rookies learn what it is like to struggle. Show them how to ask for help from the veterans, show them how to fundraise, how to design an omnidrive, how to build an effective manipulator. FIRST is about growth... but to be honest, I dont think it can sustain the opposite curve of growth Stephen is suggesting. If it becomes too big, too political, too fast, it just wont have the same effect.

I know... I didnt really stay on the topic, but I will be honest, I dont know what is expected in this thread.

[Beth Sweet]

I just want to clarify something that I am pretty sure is true, however people seem to be confusing. With the Niagara Triplets at least, the students, all of them from all teams, work with their mentors to design and build the robot. Steve, correct me if I am incorrect with this, but I don't feel like Steve is in any way insinuating that the veteran does everything and the rookie goes by observation only. I've watched the Niagara Triplets, the kids are assisted and helped by their mentors when they get stuck, but to the best of my knowledge, all team members contribute in all aspects.

[rourke]

I take it as a good sign that this thread didn’t need to get moved into the moderated section.

I’ve had a number of private messages and e-mails from mentors who really like this approach to growth. As many of you have pointed out, there are endless ways of packaging collaborative approaches depending on the circumstances.

Woodie declares FIRST “a microcosm of the real-world experience”. The real-world is moving towards global collaborative enterprises. GM & Ford will share a 6-speed Transmission in 2007. GM & Toyota manufacture Vibe’s and Matrix’s in the same plant together. The Chevy Equinox is built in a joint venture between GM and Suzuki. And when you examine the explosive growth of the automotive industry in Asia, you will encounter a complex set of alliances and strategic partnerships all collaborating together for the purpose of GROWTH. Collaborating in FIRST Robotics is a microcosm of what is already transforming society, for all the same reasons. I’m concerned that if we take a hard line and insist that teams try to do everything on their own, then we are burying our heads in the sand. Collaboration is happening in the real-world at an accelerated pace.

Now, back to the challenge. For those of you that are working on growth initiatives in your region, when you begin with the premise that collaboration is a means to get a new team off the ground you will be more successful in attracting school administrators and sponsors. You will be more successful in getting them to put some money down on a venture that already has some sort of successful support system. You will more likely be able to get a teacher to sign up for a new school robotics club when they know they have a sure thing.

This thread has generated some healthy and enlightening debate. But in addition to debate, I was seeking to hear from those teams that are actively pursuing applying collaboration to their region to help with growth. Or I was seeking to hear from teams who are now comfortable with the concept and will consider it in the future. I know from some of your private messages that there are unique and creative collaborative approaches brewing. Let’s hear from some visionaries on some plans…..