why sooo many bad robots in 07

[JaneYoung]

This one is going to be long -
What is going to stay the same as FIRST continues to grow, evolve, and mature:
- veteran teams with a lot of experience
- middle aged teams that continue to acquire experience
- rookie teams formed by former mentors of other teams
- rookie teams formed by college mentors who are high school alumni of former teams
- rookie teams who have very little experience/knowledge of FIRST

All teams contend with students entering and leaving in a cyclical manner. Teams that rely heavily on students for development of the team usually go through a rebuilding phase when significant numbers graduate, leaving behind a less experienced group.

There are teams who rely heavily on mentors for development and this can be consistent or inconsistent, depending on the team's ability to retain the mentors. Some teams have retained the same mentors for many seasons, some can not obtain mentors and some can not keep mentors - for a variety of reasons.

Veteran teams and all teams are susceptible to changes in sponsors and/or amounts donated/obtained
Not all teams have ready access to corporate sponsorship and have to get creative
Not all teams have ready or easy access to materials
Weather plays a role
The yearly challenge plays a role
The materials play a role

Even through changes, each of the teams will continue to improve as they continue to develop and mature. I sometimes think of this as a moving spiral. When I think of the spiral, there are always teams at the bottom, in the middle, and at the top of the spiral. Depending on the circumstances of the season, some will move upward more quickly than others and some may even fall from the top.

As far as a competition, we build robots to compete. Build and compete go together. Building robots and building people go together. Veteran teams and rookie teams find ways to compete together in the same competition, together. That has been the FIRST I know. Things may be getting a little slack in the time management before crating and for many of the reasons stated, thus shipping robots that aren't as prepared as they could be at the time of uncrating - but in many parts of this, I think the problems still fall within the norm.