How many teams are 100% student built

[Brian C]

With team 1468 our goal is to have the robot about %85-%90 student with the mentors assisting the other %10-%15 of the time. This is primarily due to the VERY limited resources available to the team so sometimes you need to be creative in what and how you do some things. This is where experience comes into play and where the mentors can pass along some skills.

The old adage of "I do you watch, We do it together, You do I watch" is what mentoring is all about.

One other thing on a personal note. While I agree that I dislike seeing only engineeers and mentors work on a robot while the students sit in the stands. I also dislike teams wearing the "%100 student built" chip on their shoulder. Both are extremes and shoould be avoided.

IMHO the right answer is a blend so that everyone learns from the experience. After being involved with FIRST sionce 1999 there is not a year that goes by that I don't learn something from the team and I hope that they can learn from me. It's truly a trade of experiences.

[Jeremiah Johnson]

If team's robots are 100% student built, then how am I, college mentor, to keep learning? Everyone is constently learning, even engineers. Heck, I'm still teaching the engineers new things.

A good thing is that on 648, we don't send anything out to be machined. All of our machining is done in-house and the students watch. We don't weld anything, so it's that much easier for students to do the hands on work.

Congrats on having a 100% student run team, but who are you learning from? A book? What if you become a mentor, will you still accept the 100% student run mantra? Or would you be jumping at the bit to get in there an do some stuff yourself?

*Sorry if my post sounded a bit harsh, didn't mean it.

[Bochek]

Team 2200 has been 100% student built to date, and we are doing just great.

Not only that but our team consists of 12 programmers and 2 people with knowledge on actually machining and physically building the robot.

me being one of them.

so far i personally have logged approx 130 hours.

Its nice to know that you built it. and that you know that it will work for sure

- Bochek

[Salik Syed]

FIRST stands for "FOR INSPIRATION AND RECOGNITION OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY" no where does it say anything about students building 100% of the robots.

I say whatever it takes to inspire the students, do it.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Bochek

Team 2200 has been 100% student built to date, and we are doing just great.

Not only that but our team consists of 12 programmers and 2 people with knowledge on actually machining and physically building the robot.
...
Its nice to know that you built it. and that you know that it will work for sure

As has been said before, if you used anything (controller, gearbox, motor, etc.) from the KOP, you aren't 100% student built. Engineers built the items in the kit.

That said, have you tested your design yet? I think you'd hate to get to your first regional and find out that the robot doesn't work, forcing you to call for reinforcements from the other teams. (And I bet that some of those extra hands will belong to engineers.) Test it now, rebuild it now, and find out why it failed if it fails.

If nothing else, you should have one engineer to figure out where you screw up when you do something wrong. An illustration: I mentored a Lego League team two years ago. The students were all rookies. The robot had trouble coming away from one mission. I looked at the "code" they had carefully and, lo and behold, I found out why they weren't consistent coming out. They'd put a right turn in with the left wheel forward instead of the right wheel backward, causing them to jam into the field element they were trying to work with. I showed them how to fix it (or how I fixed it, I forget which) and told them to consider it a learning experience. This is what the mentors are for--preventing or fixing student errors that cost the team time or money.

100% student built is not necessarily a good thing. 95% student built means that you have a mentor who will help you to do better.

[Mr. Van]

I'm going to chime in here. For those who don't know, I'm the coach of the RoboDox - Team 599 from CA.

We have been, in the past, one of those "We're really proud to have a completely student built robot and a completely student run teams." We've been very successful with this approach - and often raised eyebrows at pits where one or two students looked at the backs of a crowd of adults surrounding the 'bot. Our students designed and built and did all of the budgeting, travel arrangements, sponsorship contacts - heck they were even responsible for contacting FedEx and shipping the robot and getting food at the regionals. The team only had one part-time engineer who we rarely saw, except at events...

Then I talked with some people like Dave Lavery, Jason Morella & Woddie Flowers. They pointed out that if you are not having students work side by side learning from mentors, you are missing half of the FIRST program. As Dave mentioned at this years kickoff, the paring of mentors and students is what makes FIRST unique.

This year, we are working hard at making contact and inviting engineers and other professionals to come and mentor our students, and I'm proud to say we have had some success. While the vast majority of the machining is done by students, they are assisted by some mentors. We've had an engineer help with programming and another with some design aspects.

The truth is that we have had difficulty finding engineers who will spend the time necessary to help our program. From what I can tell, engineers come to a team one of two major ways: They are employed by a company that sponsors the team, or they are parents of students on the team. I think that there are many teams started by a group of interested students (and possibly a teacher) who must go out and look for sponsorship and mentorship. This can be very, very difficult.

So we are moving from the 100% student built to a 100% FIRST team as best we can. To that end, I'd like to know if other teams are in this situation, or if anyone has advice on finding mentoring engineers.

Mr. Van
Coach, Team 599
The RoboDox

[Brian C]

Originally Posted by Bochek

Team 2200 has been 100% student built to date, and we are doing just great.

Not only that but our team consists of 12 programmers and 2 people with knowledge on actually machining and physically building the robot.

me being one of them.

so far i personally have logged approx 130 hours.

Its nice to know that you built it. and that you know that it will work for sure

- Bochek

Adam,

Given your team number I'm figuring you're a rookie team. As a suggestion I would take your design and test, test, test and when you figure it's perfect.....test some more.

This has nothing to do with student built, engineer built or trained monkey built. It has to do with making sure you have no unpleasant surprises at your Regional.

Good Luck!

[Bochek]

Originally Posted by Brian C

Adam,

Given your team number I'm figuring you're a rookie team. As a suggestion I would take your design and test, test, test and when you figure it's perfect.....test some more.

This has nothing to do with student built, engineer built or trained monkey built. It has to do with making sure you have no unpleasant surprises at your Regional.

Good Luck!

not to worry, we have been testing it whenever possible, all that is currently complete is the drive train, (chassis, electronics, air compressor, exct) and i have a good start on the end effector (manipulator)

can anyone smell the fisher price?

- Bochek

[Choi9111]

We are 100% student built...we get some help every now and then but other than that 100% YEAH!

[chris31]

Alot, but not all of the team is run by the students. Yes there are things that adults do and yes the kids also have there jobs. Obviuosly money is handled by the adults. The bot is mostly student built (We do enjoy making parents hold things while while we bolt something down, etc). The engineers take a hands off role but are willing to give there opinions and warnings when we ask.

I just hate teams that all you see are adults working on the bot in the pits at regionals.

[T3_1565]

I'm going to have to go with 95% student built. Our mentors do help us a lot with design and some of the harder things like welding and stuff that some of us don't quite understand yet.. but we do learn from them so that we will know how to do it for the next time. But other than that we do most of the work, they point out what we do wrong

[Dasistmeinmoped]

I am VERY proud to say team 41 from Watchung Hills Regional High School is 100% student built. and 99.9% student designed. This normal would be 100% however a former student has returned for a year, and has been providing some guiding in the design area. Jeff is really pushing us beyond what we though might be team 41 possible.

made for students, by students.

[maltz1881]

Team 1322 is MOSTLY student built. They do the lathing most of the machining etc. If we didn't let our main mentor Joe get in there (he is the 1 last year who cut off the 2 fingers!! ) then we would go through so many boxes of kleenex from hearing him cry!!!!!! Plus that the kids love it when he makes a boo boo other then the obvious of course cuz then it was us using the kleenex!!

[rohit]

Students do almost all of the work on my team. My friend does robotics at another school (dont want to name) & when I asked him what he does, he said that he just sits at the meetings and comes home. I think that thats just not right

[T3_1565]

Originally Posted by rohit

Students do almost all of the work on my team. My friend does robotics at another school (dont want to name) & when I asked him what he does, he said that he just sits at the meetings and comes home. I think that thats just not right

yeah I agree that isn't right.. Some people on my team are like that. I dissapprove but seeing as the team is not a dictatorship I don't have the final say in the matter lol But there are quite the few this year that are willing to help!