Team 808 not participating in 2007

[mtaman02]

As far as recruiting is concerned NO one team should wait up until graduation day to realize that you went from 25+ members down to a handfall and possibly even less than that if you only count those in which are truly dedicated. It's always good to keep the recruiting of members alive by making constant announcements at the beginning of the day that the team is looking for students to come and join the team. You should be able to get at least a new face or two on a daily basis.

I am kinda interested in the 70 hour rule you guys have and would like to know about it. If its what I think it is and I'm not to sure about it maybe you guys should try chopping the 70 hour rule down to maybe 48 hours instead.

Fundraising is always a must. No one team can honestly go off and compete off of sponsorship alone. Unless its a really big named company / organization. Sponsorship is not always dependable so whatever fundraising that gets done will help and fill in the gaps the sponsorship missed.

Myself coming and graduating from a team of maybe a dozen kids as well as a team with very little funding from sponsorhip; I can understand and sympathize for your team. It feels horrible to be the smallest and underfunded team in FIRST, But guess what with the little bit you have you can come a long way from having nothing at all. I wouldn't go behind my mentors back and doing something they said can't be done however I would continue to rub hope in their faces and continue to tell them that there are other options.

While I won't be too detailed as to where I came from since many of the local members on CD (local in my area anyways) know me, My old team had about 15 participating students on a yearly basis. 6 - 8 of which were extremely dedicated. We managed to build a name for ourselves and made ourselves known to FIRST in every way a large team could. We built extremely robust robots with little to no funding, thanks to the mentors who had much knowledge of what they were doing. The 15 of us that went to competitions cheered louder than the larger teams competing. And if you were to walk in the school and look at the awards cabinet you will notice that with as many students on the team participating and with as much funding we stuggled with on getting we have become one of the many success stories of FIRST. A Team with nothing - No funding - No membership have won close to or above 30 awards most of which came from the regionals and championship and the few from off-season competitions all awards ranging from Quality to Team Spirit to Event Winning. Even with nothing you can be successful, You 6 students and that teacher should have another meeting and re-discuss what could be done to keep the team alive. Boxing up the shop would be one option I wouldn't accept. All you need at that drivers station is 2 drivers a human player and a mentor a total 4 members from the team. I say you guys can do it. All you need is funding. Theres plenty of time to register your team and elect your first Regional. Remember the deadline is in December and Kickoff is in January.

If you guys need help there are plenty of teams in this organization that will be more then glad to help you guys with whatever your needs are.

We are a family and family members help one another.

[Safarley2901]

Well Mtaman, I wasn't a member of the team then. I onto the team in the middle of the situation.

The hours required came from an average of Hours/team member last year.

70 hours was not considered an outrageous request. The Most dedicated had upward of 200. But next year that will be something to look at. I guess I really don't want to recruit people who aren't interested at all. We had that happen last year, and it turned into disaster. So we're struggling, but First for Team 808 isn't going to happen this year. Next year it will, I'm NOT going to give up my senior year for lack of funding or lack of interest, I don't really care what the rest of the team thinks.

Thanks for your encouragement,

-Steve

[Al Skierkiewicz]

Seventy hours is about 10hr/week during the build season with no regionals thrown in. Our students on robot mechanical, electrical, playing field, strategy and software put in at least one 3 hour night plus Saturday during the build. One week from ship, this skyrockets.

[mtaman02]

Yeah I had a feeling that was the 70 hour requirement was all about. I actually kinda like that requirement. It seems unfair and all but the truth is in order to go and spectate you have to work for it. I like that method.


If I sounded a little too forward in that last message than I'm sorry.

I guess every team can use a break for a season. Gives them a chance to build themselves up and all.

Looking forward to seeing you guys in '08

[team1852]

Too bad about the dwindling interest but I think you could probably build a robot with 6 members. It will most likely be very tight and stressfully - but isn't it always ...

[Safarley2901]

Well, Its not the building part thats the problem. Our mentor has barely time right now to come one night a week. Last season, we had no mentors there, and just people parents and one coach who came to watch. We still did pretty well considering (1st place for a day and half). That was the regional, where we got turned down for invites in the tournament. :-p It was interesting to have both martian teams turn us down, and then try and pick eachother, we got a good laugh out of it.

[Travis Hoffman]

Originally Posted by Safarley2901

Well, Its not the building part thats the problem. Our mentor has barely time right now to come one night a week. Last season, we had no mentors there, and just people parents and one coach who came to watch.

So you need more funding and mentorship support - never hurts to start looking within your community now, even if your team does take a one year hiatus.

Has your team ever gone out into the Alliance community seeking help from area businesses? Many teams have developed a "tiered rewards" program that grants different levels of promotional advertising to companies and individuals based upon the level of financial and personal commitment they donate to the team. Here is one such example from one notoriously successful team :

http://moe365.org/prospective_sponsors.php

Teams 48 and 2010 are working on their own sponsorship drive plans (geared toward the current economic state of affairs in Northeast Ohio) and are preparing to go out into the Warren and Champion communities to seek out help from area businesses, which have long been an untapped source of support for 48 (who has relied almost exclusively upon Delphi for corporate support for nine years) and will hopefully be a primary source of support for 2010. We are integrating rewards for personal time commitment and team mentorship into the overall plan, to go along with the standard promotional considerations for monetary donations. Time is money, after all! We'd be happy to share this plan with your team leaders.

One other potential source of income - NASA provides a one year grant to veteran teams who want to attend new regionals. This year, that includes the New Orleans Regional. 10 such "veteran grants" are available for New Orleans. Get a bus and go! Here's the link to the application page:

http://robotics.nasa.gov/events/firs...ication_07.php

In addition to the competition itself, I can think of many educational opportunities travelling to that competition and that region of the nation would provide to 808's students, considering the events that have affected that region over the past year. Maybe that would be a unique selling point to your school and your team advisor? Just an idea.

[Kyle379]

http://www.girardrobotics.com/media.htm

This is a link to the Robocats 379 team media page. It contains a link to our hand out on how to raise $30,000.00. This may be helpful in the fund raising area!