Giving First A bad name

[artdutra04]

Originally Posted by Dantvman27

Does anyone else have trouble recruiting new team members due to shows like battle bots? Whenever we do a school robot demonstration at club fairs and parent things, we always get kids that want to build destructive bots and when they see what we really do, they leave or never show up.

I know this may sound weird, but just work along with it. (When life gives you lemons, make lemonade!)

If you get a bunch of kids really interested in robotics, then don't scare them off by saying "we can NEVER do that, because that's BattleBots!". To them, once you tell them they can only build 'nice robots' they may loose interest and think its boring without ever giving it a try.

To retain these members, don't tell them it's not BattleBots right away. Let them come in to your meetings, and actually start working on the robot. Once they actually start working with their hands on an actual robot, they will take the transition from a 'BattleBot mentality' to a 'FIRST mentality' much easier, meaning you'll be able to retain more members.