The Triplet Challenge

[BBnum3]

I'm going to respond to some parts of this thread, not necessarily the original post, so disregard this if you think it is off-topic.

One thing I've seen a lot of criticism towards is the "Paint-by-Numbers" method of collaboration. To me it seems like this doesn't even fit what collaboration actually means. Merriam Webster says that collaboration means "to work jointly with others or together especially in an intellectual endeavor." If one team gives another plans to build a robot that the first team has designed, there is no working jointly and no intellectual work happening in this situation for the team receiving the plans. As far as I know, there have not been any instances of this happening, aside from (in my understanding) some virtual teams. If it did actually happen, as many people have stated before, I would be completely against it, as it takes all of the inspiration out of the FIRST experience.

[Kims Robot]

So I keep reading through this thread, and I was brought back to Lindsay's post and the posts of several people who have "met the triplets"

Everyone keeps saying how inspired the team is, how inspirational they are, etc... And maybe this goes off topic a little, but I would like to hear some stories of how this collaboration exactly "inspires" in a DIFFERENT way from normal teams (yes we are all driven to beat the best of the best, yes we all learn how to use tools we never would have touched outside FIRST, yes all of us gain confidence to meet others, to work with other teams, etc), so what is different??

I'm really glad that Lindsay, and the other students are "inspired" but from everything I have read (and no, I really haven't met their students), I think many of us would benefit in knowing EXACTLY how they are inspired... give us some of the crazy/cool stories, show us how collaboration is different... why the teams chose to continue collaborating this year, what the rest of the world can gain from this.... help us learn all this, instead of just bickering back and forth, "my way is better" "no my way is better".

What I am looking for is the "above and beyond" stories... for example, we end up talking a lot with our janitors late at night... one of them got so involved he came to the local regional last year, and again this year... by the end of this year, he told us that he now wants to go back to college because of all he has seen with us! (Yes I know this has nothing to do with "collaboration", but I'm looking for the stories that make the collaboration different from just "mentoring" rookie FIRST teams like most other teams do.)

I think these stories (because I'm sure they are there) would be incredibly effective in convincing this forum and many others of the true effectiveness of the collaboration... because I think everyone here is getting too defensive/offensive because we don't know the real deal. Everyone keeps saying "well go talk to us/them in their pit" ok ok I get that, but its not going to stop this thread from escalating...

[Jay TenBrink]

I’d like to explain why and how the Martian Twins happened this year.

History: Team 70 was a small veteran team operating out of Kettering University that was about to disband. Their mentor was retiring and there was nobody to take his place. Our team did not have mentor resources available to send there to keep the team going. We did, however, believe we could mentor two teams, 494 and 70, at the same location.

Mentoring: Our team leader and another mentor secured sponsorship for this second team. All the other mentor tasks that are mostly invisible to the students were done by shared mentor resources: registering for events, travel and accommodations, ordering team shirts, ordering raw materials and components, meeting with school administrators, book keeping, etc. All of these activities are essential, represent a lot of mentor time and energy, and can be done in bulk (for multiple teams) more efficiently. These aren't’t tasks generally associated with providing the inspiration or recognition to our students.

Membership: Students from surrounding high schools were invited to join. Currently we have students from two other area schools and expect to have more in the future.

The student experience:
All activities for brainstorming the game and robot are done as a combined group.
Building of mock-ups and “mules” to prove out concepts is done jointly.
Construction of the robots, programming, etc. is done jointly in our modest shop, which is the balcony above the gym that we share with the cheer leading team.
All students participate in fund raising.
Each team has a distinct pit crew and drive team. Scouting is a collaborative effort.

The bottom line is this: Mentor resources are limited and burn-out is a real danger in FIRST. Collaboration was essential to keep this second team in existence. There simply were not mentor resources available to sustain it on its own. Nobody was cheated out of their inspiration or handed a Pre-built robot or a complete design, it was all done together. This project was not undertaken as part of our plan for Martian domination of planet Earth, but to the best we could with what we had to work with. I sincerely believe this was and will continue to be good for FIRST.

Jay

[Jack Jones]

What Jay didn't mention was that 494 and 70 stretched themselves even further by fronting team 1213 $4k in order for them to make the initial payment deadline. They went further yet to organize a raffle where the two teams worked together/separate to pay back the Martians' kitty. Neither 70 nor 1213 would have been in the hunt this year without 494.

Maybe next year 1213 will wise up and ask to borrow Jay instead of the cash.

[Freddy Schurr]

I would like to give my 2 cents on this topic

The Triplet Challenge sounds like a fun and innovative way to get more students into FIRST and partake in an engineering competition. However, I believe that it would not happen for several reasons. One, it sounds boring to have a same design for 3 or 4 teams. I like it when I go to a competition and see how everyone has approach the game from a different angle. “Who did this?” and “How does the mechanism work?” are some of the questions that I asked myself when I looked at about 400 robots all season. Everyone has a different approach to the game and it is more interesting when you get to see how they will affect how the game piece is use. Second, it may be a disadvantage to teams that make one robot. 2-3 Teams that have the same robot design and are effective enough to get the job done can outlast any one robot team. Lastly, it causes more problems when it comes to paying for everything; you got the competition fee, and then everything else on the outside. You basically got to spend you whole entire pre-season doing sponsorship if you don’t have a corporate sponsor. As a mentor on Team 204, I am dealt the task of finding money with students for us to go to the competition and other matters. Now try doing not once, but twice. It is a difficult challenge. Do not get me wrong, we actually have looked into doing a “Niagara Triplet” kind of thing here in South Jersey, however it is a difficult challenge to try and get everyone on board.

Just giving a little feedback to CD.

[rourke]

Originally Posted by Freddy Schurr

It is a difficult challenge. Do not get me wrong, we actually have looked into doing a “Niagara Triplet” kind of thing here in South Jersey, however it is a difficult challenge to try and get everyone on board.

Freddy raises a valid concern with respect to beginning a collaborative growth strategy similar to what was done with The Triplets. In a previous post, Karthik promised to make this the subject of a post-season paper. In the meantime I will outline what I believe are some prerequisite requirements based on our experiences. More to follow in the post-season.

Prerequisites for a NiagaraFIRST style collaboration:

• Mentor consensus on the growth strategy.
• An established, experienced, and capable base team.
• Mentor diversity and single-point leaders – with mentors having different “lead” responsibilities for elements of the collaboration, as well a lead mentor that represents each school team’s interests.
• A new team(s) whose teacher (and any new mentors) prefers to learn from an experienced team.
• Acceptance that all teams will share resources and facilities. There must be a vision for how these resources or facilities can be shared so that everyone can be involved.
• A common organizational framework for each team to facilitate communication and to keep the collaboration aligned.
• Education and training materials for all aspects of the project delivered in the pre-season.
• A web based bulletin board and forum for communication and information exchange.
• A disciplined project management, scheduling, and review process for each team.
• A weekly forum where all mentors gather to discuss progress, lessons learned, and improvement opportunities.

[Lil' Lavery]

Sorry to rez a dead thread, but this has been bugging me for a few days. I originally made a post offering the evidence of 116's history to support either side of the topic. The evidence itself, in many situations, at least how I originally presented it, seemed a bit biased against the need for sucess to sustain a team. I, however, forgot to include one very significant detail, that I remembered (and have no idea how I forgot in the first place), that presents another valid argument.
In 1999, 116 moved from South Lakes High School, to nearby Herndon High School for reasons of faculty support. South Lakes would have a "rookie" team in 1999 (even though 116 was much more of a rookie in terms of membership than the south lakes team. 116 retained it's NASA sponsorship and almost all of the mentors at HHS though), but it would only last one year.
Sorry again for rezzing a dead thread, but this was buggin me and I couldn't edit my old post for some reason

[Karthik]

Well, it's only been a couple of minutes since I made this post:

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...1&postcount=36

Originally Posted by Karthik

BTW, There will be no triplets in 2007.

But, since I've already gotten a couple of IMs about it, I thought I should explain.

When the NiagaraFIRST collaboration was first conceived, after seeing the 60/254 collaboration in 2004, it was never planned to be a permanent solution. The purpose of the collaboration was to help develop two new rookie teams to the point where they could stand on their own two feet, as successful teams. After two years of mentoring by 1114, we feel that the groundwork has been laid for both 1503 & 1680 to go out on their own. Both teams have had the time to develop a solid base of resources. In fact, 1503 went out made a pretty big free agent signing.

So, what does this mean for NiagaraFIRST? The NiagaraFIRST community still exists to help the teams of the region share resources. It's just that this year, you won't see three copies of the same robot. 1114 is going at it alone.

That being said, Team 1114 has helped start two new rookies teams this year. Team 2056 - Stoney Creek SS and Team 2166 - Appleby College. We will be mentoring both these teams, but again they will not have the same robot as us. Logistically, it's just not feasible for us anymore. Although, I would expect many of the local teams to have similar drivebases, as we've made all our drawings from 2005 & 2006 public.

We look forward to an amazing season, and the further growth of FIRST in the Niagara region.

[Mr. Van]

Originally Posted by Karthik

That being said, Team 1114 has helped start two new rookies teams this year. Team 2056 - Stoney Creek SS and Team 2166 - Appleby College. We will be mentoring both these teams, but again they will not have the same robot as us.

First off, congratulations and thank you for helping new teams!

As for not having the same robot, I believe that this is as it should be. The GDC works very, very hard to come up with a game where a rookie team using the basic elements in the KoP can come up with a good effective robot. With help and mentoring support from an experienced team, they can get that much more out of the experience but in the end, they will still be able to say "This is our 'bot!"

Good luck in 2007.

-Mr. Van
Coach, 599 - The RoboDox

[JamesBrown]

Originally Posted by Mr. Van

First off, congratulations and thank you for helping new teams!

As for not having the same robot, I believe that this is as it should be. The GDC works very, very hard to come up with a game where a rookie team using the basic elements in the KoP can come up with a good effective robot. With help and mentoring support from an experienced team, they can get that much more out of the experience but in the end, they will still be able to say "This is our 'bot!"

Good luck in 2007.

-Mr. Van
Coach, 599 - The RoboDox

I think that you understand how the triplet collaboration worked, All three teams put in alot of work on their robot and all of the teams certainly could say "this is my bot" This thread turned ugly quickly because people didn't understand the concept of the collaboration. I know your intentions were good but I don't think the triplet debate should continue, 1114 used the collaboration to start up 2 new teams both of whom this year will be competitive with out the collaboration, I am sure whatever they will be doing this year to assist the new teams will be equally effective. Hopefully this time there will be more focus on what it is they do rather than bashing them for the way they do it.

James

[MGoelz]

My team, Cyber Blue, is currently in the process of working towards a similar goal as suggested. Lack of interest caused a potentially all-girl team to never quite start. They would be the POWER team. We decided that the best way to get people interested was to build a second robot, similar to ours that they would be able to use over the summer at the IRI. What better way to promote FIRST, than to take a small group of people, give them a "loaner" persay, robot, and let them experience a FIRST competition for themselves?

All in all, a great way to promote all aspects of FIRST.

[AdamHeard]

Originally Posted by MGoelz

My team, Cyber Blue, is currently in the process of working towards a similar goal as suggested. Lack of interest caused a potentially all-girl team to never quite start. They would be the POWER team. We decided that the best way to get people interested was to build a second robot, similar to ours that they would be able to use over the summer at the IRI. What better way to promote FIRST, than to take a small group of people, give them a "loaner" persay, robot, and let them experience a FIRST competition for themselves?

All in all, a great way to promote all aspects of FIRST.

It would be cool if you didn't quite finish that robot and had helped the new team finish it so they could gain some good hands on experience. They would also probably be more attached as it would be part theirs, not just a loaner...