Supported by school or sponsor?

[G1279]

School gave us a shed in the school parking lot, the size of four pit spaces. With all the maintenance supplies, a golf cart, robot crate, 5-8 kids and a robot, it get pretty small, and with no heat, pretty cold too. Luckily parents brought in enough space heaters to keep us working this season. We got $6,000 from our main sponsor, the most ever, and enough to allow us to compete again. Our other money comes in from parent donations and our snack cart. We sell snacks and drinks right after school for about a half hour. Thats were the other large portion of money comes from. We have one teacher adviser, a civil engineer and science teacher. Two parent mentors, an electrical engineer and a computer engineer who spend countless hours working with us. Our electrical engineer is also a sponsor. He owns his own business and helps supplies us with the needed tools and materials for the season. This year he also had an empty space in one of his buildings he was renovating to build a rack to test with.

We don't have much but we are lucky and grate full nonetheless. This is our fifth year as a team now. Our record stands 2004: NJ Rookie of the Year; 2005: #1 Seed VCU Regional, Semi-Finalist, NJ Regional Winners; 2006: NJ Regional Winners; 2008: NJ Semi-Finalist. It doesn't matter what you have to work with, its how you use it. With the right people, determination, innovation and drive to succeed, anything is possible.

[DeAnnaC]

We are a community based team formed thru a non-profit - no schools sponsor us. We have kids from 6 different high schools from all over the county and alot of homeschooled kids.

We do our own funding/fundraisers and purchase our own equipment. We currently have a table top drill press and a table top bandsaw, the rest of our tools are handtools. The computers we have will not run any of the software that comes in the KOP, but hopefully we can do something about that in the off season as the animation team is really coming together and needs stable, available machines to work with year round.

The location we meet at is donated as well and we move about every 10 months to a new spot. Some of our kids drive 45 min each way (the rest of us it's 25 mins) to nightly meetings during build season, weekly during the off season. We also attend fundraisers for other non-profits, parades and community events about every 2nd or 3rd weekend during the off season, so we stay busy year round.

We have no teachers, our mentors are a mix of people and include some parents.

[ezygmont708]

Both,

Team 708 receives support from our schools and our Sponsors. The schools provide transportation, and a building space. As far as money, the majority of this comes from our corporate sponsors. The school also provides us with the same non-profit coverage that other teams and clubs receive.

A big thanks goes out to our sponsors...

Motorola... Primary monetary sponsor, mechanical and program engineers.
AMI Semiconductor... Monetary Sponsor, electrical engineer.
Cenotocor... Monetary Sponsor, Strategy mentor.
Immunicon... Monetary Sponsor, Machining, Mechanical Engineers.

Our sponsors and our engineers our the life of our organization. A big thankyou goes out from TEAM 708!!!

[Jim E]

Team 1523 still has school support this year in the form of classrooms, machinery, storage, and monetary support. However , the bulk of our $$ support comes from the student members in dues and community business support.

The teacher is stepping down next year to go back to school and one primary sponsor is backing out. At this time, the details are being discussed on how we will function in 2009.

[Nathans]

Our school gives us space to work and, starting this year, pays our advisors out of a grant for after-school programs we just got. All of our money comes from other sources, and we don't have a consistent major sponsor. Our ability to fundraise has been restricted, but we got a grant from Honda which kept us afloat this year. We're still working out how we're going to stay afloat, since that's far from a guarantee at the moment.

[Laura_587]

We get an unused room in the basement and electricity from the school, and the schoolboard might give us some money this year. But most of our funds come from local businesses and our parents/mentors, who buy a lot of tools and parts.

[scottydoh]

The school paid the $6,000 for registration and a classroom, which we had to share with two other classes during the day. and they do just about every thing possible to prohibit us for finishing, from taking parts from out closet, to kicking us out on saturday and sunday and the last 5 days of build season, we had to go to a mentors house to finish working. As for the rest of our money, it comes from our sponsors and mentors.

But what really makes me curious, is why so many schools don't support their robotics teams?

Reading to previous posts in this thread, it seems like a majorits of teams are not supported by their schools, and it almost seems like the schools hate their teams, sticking them out in cold sheds, or not even giving them a place to work. I know right now my school is making a big deal over how important technology is, and how its the future, but they are talking out of both sides of their face, because over the past 3 years they have cut almost every technology course offered, and pretend that our robotics team even exists. Our school administrators actually laugh at us when the team makes any kind of request.

I just think that it "technology is now", then schools should do a little more to support their teams. Maybe Dean's Homework next year should be to enlighten your schools about the wonders of FIRST.

[CarterM]

Unions and Laziness, They don't realize that these clubs are the future generations. That's all there is to it!!!!


btw, Robotics is much cooler than Sports, They just don't realize it.

[scottydoh]

Originally Posted by CarterM

Unions and Laziness, They don't realize that these clubs are the future generations. That's all there is to it!!!!


btw, Robotics is much cooler than Sports, They just don't realize it.

I completely agree

[Mr. Van]

Originally Posted by CarterM

Unions and Laziness, They don't realize that these clubs are the future generations. That's all there is to it!!!!

Be careful with blanket statements like this. What evidence do you have that your school faculty is lazy? Why would you say that "Unions" are the reason that schools do not support robotics teams?

I would suggest that many of the faculty sponsors in FIRST are in a union - and glad of it.

I would suggest that one reason schools do not support robotics teams is that they can't find a faculty member who is able to donate the hundreds of hours above and beyond the call of their already difficult jobs. Another reason might be liability. A third obvious reason is cost. How many school activities have a cost/student ratio anywhere as high as FRC?

For those who get "nothing more than a working space" - consider the cost of that space if you had to rent it and pay the utility bills.

We are very, very fortunate to have a great deal of support from our school and administration. It took years and years of work, but it has been worth it.

-Mr. Van
Coach, Robodox

[Lkr220]

The Pascack Valley Regional High School District has always been very supportive of Team 1676. They've always allowed us to use the Tech Lab and Autoshop for building purposes, and we're allowed to stay pretty late (they kick us out around 11:30/12). Last year they started to financially support the team as well.

Because of all that, they are our biggest sponsor/supporter. Then we have corporate sponsors such as KPMG and Dassault Falcon Jet that monetarily support us. All in all I think we have around 15 companies that sponsor us in some way...our website has a more detailed breakdown.

[IndySam]

After reading this thread I feel very fortunate to have our school behind us.

They provide us meeting space, a full machine shop, and stipends for two teachers. They also give us a nice budget to spend on robot parts, transportation and great moral support.

We have always had a good relationship with the school but since forming our parents group it has gotten even stronger. You would be surprised what a group of parents can get when they ask nicely.

We also couldn't participate in this program without the generous donations of our sponsors; Proportion Air, Rolls Royce, Indiana Department of Workforce Development and numerous smaller sponsors.

[GaryVoshol]

Originally Posted by scottydoh

But what really makes me curious, is why so many schools don't support their robotics teams?

When the choice is between supporting a robotics team or buying books and supplies, paying salaries, paying utilities ... guess what wins? Schools are not endless money supplies. Most of them struggle with every dollar of taxpayer support.

[nofar#1943]

In my team, the sponsers really helped us not only with money and supplies but also with the planning and even gave us solutions that we never dreamt of.
We don't realy get support from our school and we treid to create awareness - this year we entered to all the classes with the robot from last year and it made more interest. Try to publish your team in school and city events and hang some posters at your school and aspecialy at the teachers lounge. Talk with the teachers and principal about how much this project gives you and rich your knowledge then evey regular lesson.


I hope it will help you,
You can ask me for more information or help.

Nofar #1943

[scottydoh]

Originally Posted by GaryVoshol

When the choice is between supporting a robotics team or buying books and supplies, paying salaries, paying utilities ... guess what wins? Schools are not endless money supplies. Most of them struggle with every dollar of taxpayer support.

I think you forgot to include sports. Look at it like this, which is more important, athletics or education, and most schools choose sports, but why (because they are like the rest of society and only care about bragging rights)? But what do sports really get you, they in know way help to better the world (of your future career).

And honestly, Im not every asking for more money out of my school, just for the fact that they would actually acknowledge our team, and not laugh at us any time we have anything to say or take our parts and tools. Actually show up to the competition and show a little support, that doesn't cost any money.