Elite (invite only) FIRST teams

Craig,

Reading through this thread, it seems as if you are, in my opinion, taking the correct approach in regards to what you are planning on asking in your applications. When I joined team 341 in High School, I had to fill out an application. M.O.E (Team 365, link) also has an application process that I think, after a quick read-over, also looks similar to what you've described as your goal for applications in post 53 (link).

Overall, I feel that your idea is viable and wish you the best of luck in starting a new team. Deciding if an application is the best way is entirely up to you. All said, I feel that both the pro and anti-application parties can agree that exposing more students to FIRST is a good thing. Best of luck.

[laurenlacy]

Originally Posted by CraigHickman

Hey folks:

So I'm going to be moving on to college next year (don't know exactly where yet, we shall see), and I'm looking to bring FIRST with me. One of my major choices does not have a team nearbye, and I think it would be fun to start one. However, my idea for the team is a little bit different than most. I have a feeling I'm going to catch a good bit of flack for this idea, but I'd like to get a sounding of it.

The team that I may found would most likely require an application or interview process in order to join. The team would be a very fast moving, highly competitive environment, meant to simulate a real world business as closely as possible. In order to have a robot design approved, a member must "sell" it to the Board (which would be senior students and mentors). This would (hopefully?) make the team a VERY competitive team, that could be relied upon to bring a fearsome robot to each competition.

That idea being said, I was hoping to gather a bit of information on teams that may already have some sort of similar system in place. My main focus is currently on requiring an application/interview or not, and so it would help a ton if people knew of any teams that have this going already.

Are there any invite only, or application required teams out there?
If so, why do they only allow successful applicants on the team, and how does it help them?
Do they have a better chance in competition?
About how many members are part of these teams?

I think it sounds like a really cool idea but you have some things to consider, as many have mentioned above. First of all your college grades are really going to come first. That first year you are going to be overwhelmed with the social aspects of college, having all that free time and trying to keep on top of your grades. It's going to be hard to start your own FIRST team that year, so you might want to just take that year to work with the school and let them know what you're interested in doing, because it also will really help to have a schools backing.

With that said, the whole application/interview process can work, but I don't know that it's something you'd be able to implement right away, for a couple of reasons:
1) Initial interest: Our robotics team in its first year had 14 kids, 8 who actually did anything. If we had an application that first year I doubt we would have had more than 4 if it would be the type of application it sounds like a team like yours would need.
2) Continuing interest: That first year it's overwhelming enough just to try to build a robot. Add the competitive business aspect to it and I think you could end up with a lot of uninterested kids. I think a team like the one you're envisioning is going to have to take baby steps towards that vision every year in order to not frighten kids away.

Coming from a very small team that turned into a very big team, a couple other thoughts...

I personally think having a "board" who votes on robot design is a great idea. Leave the ultimate choice to the people who know the most about what will work and what won't. That still gives everyone a chance to have their ideas heard but allows for greater success, imho.

An application can only work if you have enough interest that you can afford to be turning people away. We would have taken any help we could get that first year, and the next year we had too much help for anyone to do anything useful. You have to be the judge of when your team would be ready to implement an application.

The number of students involved in teams requiring an application can vary greatly. Mine had 30 or so. It kind of depends on whether you want to have a business subteam, how you are dividing up the robot building, a number of factors. When we implemented an application I don't know that it went any better, mainly because even if you're gung ho about robotics at the beginning of the year and fill out a great application, it doesn't guarantee that you're going to contribute as much as your enthusiasm suggests. We had to ask a few people to leave.

Another thing is that as a college student starting a team, assuming you don't end up living in the same area you went to college, you're going to need to build a model of sustainability that works well in a college environment... your mentors, unlike on many teams, are probably only putting in a max 4 year commitment, and you need to build the framework of the team taking this fact into account.

Good luck!

[SteveJanesch]

Craig,

There's a bunch of stuff necessary to your plan that you haven't elaborated on, which you'll have to get going week 1 of your fall freshman semester:

1. convincing a school or group to start the team - especially difficult in an area where there aren't already FIRST teams, and no one's been to a competition
2. funding from said school or group, industry sponsors, and the like.
3. finding meeting space, build space, tools, parts, practice space.
4. finding other mentors (how many people did you envision on your review board?)
5. convincing parents to get involved
6. getting transportation to meetings, for students from other schools or if meeting space isn't on school grounds
7. managing transportation, lodging, meals, and chaperones for the trip to competition (our closest regional is 4+ hours away, in another state - it's a three day trip). Each state has laws about adults traveling with minors not related to them.

That's all I could think of in about two minutes.

My point is, if you're the one starting this team, then all the above administrative tasks are your responsibility before you even think about getting close to the robot. You might think you can farm them out, you may even get people who say they're going to do it, but you can't count on it. You've got to be prepared to do any administrative task that needs to be done.

What worries me is that your plan seems to be based on pure optimism. Have you started up a club before? Folks on this message board are here because they're already excited about FIRST, and know what it's about, so we don't need convincing how great a program it is. That's not true of most of the population - they haven't heard, and they need convincing. How thoroughly have you thought through your contingencies? What happens if there aren't as many students as you hoped, or their skill sets don't quite cover all the bases? How about if they don't get along with each other? Are you the right guy to step in and mediate? Can you settle disputes without having one of the parties get mad and quit? What gets your priority when your time is tight - your coursework or the kids?

Think it through. Be prepared to deviate from your original plan. Good luck.

- Steve

[Team 135]

Team 135 does this. Our team has to many people wanting to be on the team at any one time that we are forced to an application process to review possible canidates and keep the best that we can find. Also our group is part of a class. We have grades on how much we attend the build period. On the off season and times that we are not at competition we must write papers for the grade in the class. We meet once every other day for the class during the off season. Our team also work like a company that is that we devide up the different aspects of the robot to different groups. There are leaders asigned to each group that make desisions on how the robot is built (with a lot of input from their group members).

Hope this helps

Wow, other people responded to this. I thought it was going to die down for a while.

Thanks for all the suggestions, folks. It's cool to know that there's people out there with lots of ready advice to help me on this. As for Washington, I'm very seriously thinking about it. Actually, I'm visiting it this week, so we shall see.

[DarkFlame145]

145 has an application, the first time I filled it out i was serious, but after that i just made a joke out of it. I mean I'm the team welder, why would they not let me in =P.

[erikab]

Our team (1717, D'Penguineers) participates in FIRST as the senior class and capstone project of the Dos Pueblos Engineering Academy (DPEA), a track of classes within the Santa Barbara-area public school Dos Pueblos. The DPEA is a 4-year program with freshmen through seniors, who take engineering, physics and computer science courses in addition to, or in place of, regular high school courses.

Seniors take a class that is dedicated to FIRST Robotics, thus there is a limit on the number of students on the team (32). Due to very high demand for the DPEA within our high school, we have had to start an application and interview process for 8th graders to enter as 9th graders. They then take 3 years of courses before participating in FIRST their senior year.

Once students are seniors, they run the DPEA and robotics class as a business, with students taking auxiliary business roles, in addition to those in engineering. For example, students work in public relations, media, web design, uniforms, school communication, etc.

We don't have students "sell" their ideas to a board during the build season, but we do have design review meetings, since thirty heads are always better than one. We have found that the application process helps to find qualified students, but that offering courses leading up to robotics also greatly increases student preparation for the season.

For more information about our academy and team, you can visit our website, www.dpengineering.org.

[HOT_SOUP]

FIRST (Yes, I know you already know this) is for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology. By having an "elite" team you definately will have the Recognition part covered, but your Inspiration will suffer horribly. I know that I personally would NOT have joined a team that had an "application" process, as it would have diturred me from the program by making me feel like there was such a thing as an person who is interested in, but unwanted by the FIRST program. When I joined my team, I could not tell you the difference between FRC and FLL, but am now a student leader/mentor and hold FIRST very close.

Originally Posted by HOT_SOUP

FIRST (Yes, I know you already know this) is for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology. By having an "elite" team you definately will have the Recognition part covered, but your Inspiration will suffer horribly. I know that I personally would NOT have joined a team that had an "application" process, as it would have diturred me from the program by making me feel like there was such a thing as an person who is interested in, but unwanted by the FIRST program. When I joined my team, I could not tell you the difference between FRC and FLL, but am now a student leader/mentor and hold FIRST very close.

See, if you had read the previous posts, you would know that very few (if any) people would be turned away from joining, and that would only happen if it was CLEAR that there wasn't interest, or that there would be time and devotion conflicts. As for the Inspiration part, how is teaching students to design, build, and operate in a business-like environment NOT inspiring? I fail to see the connection there...

[HOT_SOUP]

Originally Posted by CraigHickman

As for the Inspiration part, how is teaching students to design, build, and operate in a business-like environment NOT inspiring? I fail to see the connection there...

My reasoning ("connection") is that It seems like you would fail to inspire people who were not already headed in that direction. FIRST is designed to GROW as well as IMPROVE the fields of science and technology. It seems like your team would only be covering the IMPROVE part.

I would like to see your REASONING as to why I am incorrect. Do not get me wrong, the prospect of an "elite" team is intriguing to me, as I am sure it is to everyone, but, as I said, I dont see it in line with the principles of FIRST

No need to be so bitter, either. What I said was my opinion of how your theoretical team would relate to FIRST principles, and I was not in any way calling you out or accusing you of something that deserved any heated replies.

Originally Posted by HOT_SOUP

My reasoning ("connection") is that It seems like you would fail to inspire people who were not already headed in that direction. FIRST is designed to GROW as well as IMPROVE the fields of science and technology. It seems like your team would only be covering the IMPROVE part.

I would like to see your REASONING as to why I am incorrect. Do not get me wrong, the prospect of an "elite" team is intriguing to me, as I am sure it is to everyone, but, as I said, I dont see it in line with the principles of FIRST

Here's what I'm seeing here: You think the program would be designed to that only people who are already in FIRST would want to join. Not so. The entire point of the thing would be to take a FIRST team, which is already awesome, and make it slightly more professional. Part of the team would involve active recruitment, as well as program longevity. It's just like any company; if not enough applicants apply, the company will go out and market itself to workers in the field.

If I'm wrong, please correct me... I get confused by my own words a lot.

[Tetraman]

The best way, like THE best way to formulate an elite FIRST robotics team is to first generate an Elite FIRST robotics competition where first place finish is reguarded as a higher honor than a Chairmans award, but not to the point where GP and the Chairmans' award mean nothing.

I've been dreaming of a high-standard higher-competition FIRST for a few years now, but because of the GP within FRC there is little chance that there is going to be an 'elite team' greater than the teams we consider elite today.

[SL8]

is this thread still about the questions you asked

Originally Posted by SL8

is this thread still about the questions you asked

Yeah. If you've been on a team that has either the business model, or an application process, it would be cool to hear about the advantages and disadvantages of such a system.

[HOT_SOUP]

Originally Posted by CraigHickman

Here's what I'm seeing here: You think the program would be designed to that only people who are already in FIRST would want to join. Not so. The entire point of the thing would be to take a FIRST team, which is already awesome, and make it slightly more professional. Part of the team would involve active recruitment, as well as program longevity. It's just like any company; if not enough applicants apply, the company will go out and market itself to workers in the field.

If I'm wrong, please correct me... I get confused by my own words a lot.

I understand. I personally would not have such a hard core system as what you are talking about, but I no longer think it would be against First principles.

I say, go for it.