What member go to competitions?

[Tristan Lall]

When faced with a question like this, I suspect that many of us will tend to envison a set of rules and conditions to deterministically select the "best" students to make the trip. There is, after all, great value in making decisions using an evidence-based approach.

I just worry that in our empiristic haste, we might overlook the possibility that sometimes, the "best" person isn't the one who needs it the most. We've all met students who have issues (for any of a multitude of reasons), and I can distinctly picture a subset of them who would benefit from the competition experience as a source of inspiration, as a diversion from life's miseries, or as an opportunity to build confidence and skill.

This is a competition, so presumably there's an advantage to selecting the most competent, most experienced and most successful. But as an educational endeavour, it's necessary to realize that you can't systematically grant every advantage to the same people all the time.

Consider what policies will do the most good in the long run. Promoting service and good grades are certainly admirable, but that doesn't mean it's always the right way to go about things.

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

About academic requirements, students grades should NEVER suffer due to involvement in FRC.

I'm not picking on you specifically, but I do feel compelled to suggest that there are students who are not planning to attend an engineering school, and for whom the grades cannot be the top priority. Consider the ones with significant psychological issues (e.g. behaviour, social skills, etc.). If they need a place where they can get a chance to learn interpersonal skills (like a team), it might just help them to become well-adjusted adults, as opposed to pathologically antisocial engineers (who got good grades).

"Never" is a strong sentiment: we should use it with caution.

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Tristan Lall

Consider what policies will do the most good in the long run. Promoting service and good grades are certainly admirable, but that doesn't mean it's always the right way to go about things.

I'm not picking on you specifically, but I do feel compelled to suggest that there are students who are not planning to attend an engineering school, and for whom the grades cannot be the top priority. Consider the ones with significant psychological issues (e.g. behaviour, social skills, etc.). If they need a place where they can get a chance to learn interpersonal skills (like a team), it might just help them to become well-adjusted adults, as opposed to pathologically antisocial engineers (who got good grades).

"Never" is a strong sentiment: we should use it with caution.

While I understand where you are coming from I must disagree. FIRST is not about the competitions, it is about inspiring kids, if we have two students who are equal in everything except student a is passing their classes whereas student b is failing 2 classes is it proper to give student b the same privileges as student b? What message is that sending? To me it is sending the message that doing the bare minimum is no longer required. In this age where standards are being lowered so more people can pass can we really encourage that? I am not saying that only students with straight A's can travel, I am saying students that are PASSING can travel. Also, this standard does not have to be set in stone, if a student fails a test and that is the only grade it is unreasonable to penalize them this strongly, let them travel with the caveat that they must study during free time. Ultimately it is up to the mentors to decide if the student and the team would benefit from having that student along.

Students on FIRST teams who are not going into engineering are important but grades should be maintained, the notion that an arts major (as an example) is somehow less challenging than engineering is very irritating to me. Just because they are not going into engineering does not mean their classes are somehow less important to them.

Psychological issues, this comes down to the mentors, the student, and the parents. The teachers may also be involved. If the mentors feel that the student is trying his/her best to do well there would be nothing wrong with making an exception with the parents and teacher's permission of course.

Essentially my point is that FRC means you miss a lot of school, if you cannot handle missing that much school you should not. If this means you don't travel Thursdays or can only come on Saturdays then that is what it takes.

[GaryVoshol]

All students in good standing are allowed to travel with the team. This includes no behavior problems, passing grades, any fees have been paid, haven't been slacking off in attendance, etc.

Since I've never been associated with a team of more than 30 students, I'm not sure why you think 40 is too many. Obviously they can't all be in the pit! But there should be enough for all of them to do - scouting, visibility, promoting the team, etc. Although I recall going to lunch in the CNN and seeing several members of a team who was in the divisional finals just lounging about on the plaza. Thursday noon I can understand - but Saturday? Why weren't they cheering their team on?

[Tristan Lall]

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

...if we have two students who are equal in everything except student a is passing their classes whereas student b is failing 2 classes is it proper to give student b the same privileges as student b? What message is that sending? To me it is sending the message that doing the bare minimum is no longer required. In this age where standards are being lowered so more people can pass can we really encourage that? I am not saying that only students with straight A's can travel, I am saying students that are PASSING can travel. Also, this standard does not have to be set in stone, if a student fails a test and that is the only grade it is unreasonable to penalize them this strongly, let them travel with the caveat that they must study during free time. Ultimately it is up to the mentors to decide if the student and the team would benefit from having that student along.

I can certainly appreciate that having passing marks is a pretty reasonable expectation; more so when, as you suggested, exceptions can be made based on other circumstances. I was addressing the idea that "the moment grades drop" students must choose schoolwork over extracurricular activity, no matter the circumstances. If your grades drop 5% from 92% because of FRC, does that mean you should be excluded? (You've clarified your position, and it doesn't look like you meant to suggest this.)

To borrow the Student A/Student B example, I'm more concerned about a case where A has good marks, a stable personal life, and no social issues, while B has none of the above, but both have made similar contributions to the team and would likely benefit the team equally at a competition. I think we ought to be assessing the benefits to the student as part of the equation.

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

Students on FIRST teams who are not going into engineering are important but grades should be maintained, the notion that an arts major (as an example) is somehow less challenging than engineering is very irritating to me. Just because they are not going into engineering does not mean their classes are somehow less important to them.

I only chose engineering as a specific example that's relevant to the interests of a lot of people in FIRST. I have similar appreciation for the value of other academic fields.

But again, I'm thinking of a different set of students: the ones who might not be going to university at all. (I could have been more specific about that.) While I realize that my example was a bit of a false dichotomy, my point was that for some of them, it would be more beneficial to focus on interpersonal skills, rather than academic ones.

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Tristan Lall

I can certainly appreciate that having passing marks is a pretty reasonable expectation; more so when, as you suggested, exceptions can be made based on other circumstances. I was addressing the idea that "the moment grades drop" students must choose schoolwork over extracurricular activity, no matter the circumstances. If your grades drop 5% from 92% because of FRC, does that mean you should be excluded? (You've clarified your position, and it doesn't look like you meant to suggest this.)

Of course not, all I mean when I say that grades shouldnt suffer is that you shouldnt fail a class because you were spending all of your time at FIRST. Learning to manage one's time is an important lesson that many of us have learned from FIRST.

Originally Posted by Tristan Lall

But again, I'm thinking of a different set of students: the ones who might not be going to university at all. (I could have been more specific about that.) While I realize that my example was a bit of a false dichotomy, my point was that for some of them, it would be more beneficial to focus on interpersonal skills, rather than academic ones.

Going back to the Student A and B example, Student A is university bound and Student B is not, they do the same thing on the team, Student B is an Introvert and A is not. They are both failing Honors English 11. Do you think it is appropriate to accept failure from one of them and not from the other? Yes it would benefit B to go, and it might inspire him but what message would it send to A? Is it a message we want to send?

The difficulty in these questions is the fairness. The reason for such rigid rules is partially to protect mentors from accusations of favoritism. The real important thing is to allow an appeals process in which the mentors (or a board of them) meet with the teacher, the student, and the student's parents and discuss steps that must be completed in order to regain the right of traveling. Make sure that students and parents are made aware that the appeals process will be handled individually and privately on a case by case basis.

[ATannahill]

Originally Posted by JBotAlan

Set out rules clearly at the beginning of the season; make sure all students have read them. Attendance, money requirements (I personally have a major distaste for a "pay-to-play" style program; require them to raise funds with the team's help instead. When we discourage members based on money, we fail horribly.), behavior and grades...make sure it is all very clear.

Work your hardest to design a system that does not exclude anyone, though. I cannot speak for others, but FIRST took on a whole new meaning when I got to witness the sights and sounds of a competition. Don't take that away!

My $0.02.
JBot

I have to say that I have suffered from this, I did not have the money to travel to two out of the three events my team went to and as a result my experience diminished, not just because of what I missed at the competition but also because people on the team thought I had lost interest and refrained from telling me about off season projects. Definantly make sure you can help a student that is financially chanlenged.

[Tristan Lall]

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

Going back to the Student A and B example, Student A is university bound and Student B is not, they do the same thing on the team, Student B is an Introvert and A is not. They are both failing Honors English 11. Do you think it is appropriate to accept failure from one of them and not from the other? Yes it would benefit B to go, and it might inspire him but what message would it send to A? Is it a message we want to send?

It's too simplistic to cast this as merely accepting failure. And besides: would you allow only A to participate, and risk sending a message to B that introversion and/or non-university studies are correlated with diminished value to the team? (Maybe the correlation is valid—but is it wise to send that message under those circumstances?)

In the scenario that you envisioned, communicating the fact that you are attempting to act fairly might be difficult, because you obviously can't go describing other individuals' personal problems when you explain the selections to the team. In that case, Student A might be justifiably annoyed at being overlooked. But I'd argue that that's just adding another dimension to the problem, rather than negating the utility of the solution; now you have to manage the situation so that it is fair (in your judgment), and also that it appears fair.

But if you can't satisfy all of the desirable criteria at once, I think it's often most important to do what's best for the student, and prepare to withstand (or deflect) the criticism that may come as a result. (This course of action obviously has many complex implications, so this is by no means an absolute rule to live by: it's just a statement of priorities.)

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

The difficulty in these questions is the fairness. The reason for such rigid rules is partially to protect mentors from accusations of favoritism. The real important thing is to allow an appeals process in which the mentors (or a board of them) meet with the teacher, the student, and the student's parents and discuss steps that must be completed in order to regain the right of traveling. Make sure that students and parents are made aware that the appeals process will be handled individually and privately on a case by case basis.

I'm very much in favour of having rules that are precise and all-encompassing so that all the bases are covered, and so that unfair treatment is unlikely. But when that isn't possible or practical, building flexibility into these rules would tend to allow some sort of equitable resolution. That's a reasonable way to provide that flexibility, but its major deficiency is that it requires the student to be rejected before the situation can be resolved.

I think that ultimately, it still comes down to our priorities: in my opinion, the people making the decisions need to attempt to evaluate the relative benefits to each student as a significant part of their deliberation.

[samir13k]

We have everyone go to our local regional, considering it is only a 2-3 hr drive. What our team does is have about 5-10 kids scouting from the stands, or walking around the pits. We also have a rotation for the students actually working in the pits. The drivers, a programmer, a mechanical person, an electrical guy, and 2 mentors are usually in the pits at a time. granted the fact that it is hard to stick to the schedule, it usually does not create a problem considering some kids stay out in the stands, and some go on the tours. As for nationals, it comes down to funding i would say. If you have enough funding, then you want to have everyone who has steadily participated go. You dont want to have to cut someone out in the opportunity. If you are going to a far away regional/national, then you probably want to take the top 8-10 students and 3 mentors. You would want to have your drivers and 1 student from each subgroup...plus scouts.

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Tristan Lall

It's too simplistic to cast this as merely accepting failure. And besides: would you allow only A to participate, and risk sending a message to B that introversion and/or non-university studies are correlated with diminished value to the team? (Maybe the correlation is valid—but is it wise to send that message under those circumstances?)

My solution would be they didnt meet the criteria stated when the joined the team and neither would travel and to make them aware of the appeals process.

Originally Posted by Tristan Lall

In the scenario that you envisioned, communicating the fact that you are attempting to act fairly might be difficult, because you obviously can't go describing other individuals' personal problems when you explain the selections to the team. In that case, Student A might be justifiably annoyed at being overlooked. But I'd argue that that's just adding another dimension to the problem, rather than negating the utility of the solution; now you have to manage the situation so that it is fair (in your judgment), and also that it appears fair.

Appearances are not important in the case I mentioned, exceptions should be made based on several factors, these factors need not be publicized. Exceptions are not the rules, they are made to allow for extenuating circumstances which the rules cannot work as expected. And need to be worked out on a case by case basis. The people who complain the most vocally about fairness are often parents, this is why parents need to be involved in the meeting and kept informed, that way they know that you are acting in their child's best interests.

Honestly I think any student who is willing to set up a meeting between his parents, teachers, and mentors is one who truly deserves to travel because they are trying to do well and deserve to be rewarded. I know that if any of the students on my team came to me and told me they just didnt get a subject I would do anything I could to get them help.

Realize, rules need to be laid down at the beginning, each student and their parent should sign a contract stating that they understand that these are the requirements of participation. Grade requirements should be set in that document as well as consequences. This is no different than sports teams do. School is more important than after school programs.

[Nica F.]

From experience on a past team, it seemed best that we limit who gets to go on each trip.

For the home regional, the whole team is allowed to attend. If the member however is in bad standings (suspension, not meeting minimum GPA requirement, etc.) they are not allowed to represent the team. They of course are allowed to attend no matter what seeing it is a public event, but aren't allowed to be in the team's pit, wear the team shirt, so on and so forth.

*In addition to meeting team standards, we require all students who plan on going on the trip to have each of their teachers sign a slip approving their ability to skip those classes. If the student is a borderline student or should not be one to miss additional classes, we highly take that into consideration.

For out of state Regionals we usually limit the students to 10 per chaperone. Generally, for out of state events, we usually bring one male and female adult giving us the opportunity to bring more or less 20 kids. The picking of the kids who get to go are based on attendance during build season, participation in fundraisers, and their contribution to the team.


Knowing that many teams have more than 20 students, we make sure to alternate who gets to go on which trips (if your team is attending more than one regional). Of course you're going to get disputes on why someone can't go on a certain trip but all trips are earned and just as others have said before me, they are privileges.

[lenny8]

Originally Posted by rtfgnow

I have to say that I have suffered from this, I did not have the money to travel to two out of the three events my team went to and as a result my experience diminished, not just because of what I missed at the competition but also because people on the team thought I had lost interest and refrained from telling me about off season projects. Definantly make sure you can help a student that is financially chanlenged.

i agree my team also has the pay to play and most kids that i know cant afford to go to multiple events. ( ive been lucky enough to be able to)lets say (just throwing numbers out there) that to go to the two reginals its 450 and then money to spend for eats,and if you want to go to nationals its more but it really is all about funding if you dont have enough sponsers your going to have to pay out of your pockets

[JaneYoung]

I know of a student who sold brownies every day during build season and afterwards, to help fund his share of travel. He had to manage grades, contribute to the build sessions, bake and sell brownies - every day. His final numbers were amazing and he did all of that without complaint.

I've also witnessed the stunning impact that attending a regional and/or the Championship can have on the students who may not be considered the core of the team or the team leadership. If it came down to selecting these students, they may have been overlooked, yet positive changes in attitudes/behaviors occurred, and decisions about their futures were deeply impacted. I've learned to never underestimate the power of inspiration.

Regarding having to make tough decisions limiting the number of those who can travel, meeting a set number of service hours donated to the team either through build, fundraising, outreach, or areas that impact the team, as well as maintaining grades, can help with the selection process.

[ATannahill]

Originally Posted by JaneYoung

I know of a student who sold brownies every day during build and afterward, to help fund his share of travel. He had to manage grades, contribute to the build sessions, bake and sell brownies - every day. His final numbers were amazing and he did all of that without complaint.

My team has mentioned that they are going to have candy for students to sell to help reduce the cost and I am waiting on that, I have not heard anything significant as of yet. The only flaw with the brownie idea is that the sale has to be approved by the school before I make any sales, and there is probably something about it having to be store bought.

[JaneYoung]

Originally Posted by rtfgnow

My team has mentioned that they are going to have candy for students to sell to help reduce the cost and I am waiting on that, I have not heard anything significant as of yet. The only flaw with the brownie idea is that the sale has to be approved by the school before I make any sales, and there is probably something about it having to be store bought.

Yup.
The point I was making in this example was that with focus, determination, and effort, strides can be made towards achieving goals such as paying for travel and helping support the team.

[ttldomination]

Well, on this topic I feel that World Competition is a great experience and it is great to have lots of people at world. A 40+ people cheering section is generally pretty good.

But if you're looking to cut down the "fat", then here are some tips.

1. Drivers(2)

2. Back-Up Drivers(2) - This is world. Take no chances

3. Coach(2) - One is backup

4. Human Player(2)- Each year the game has a 4th player often known as the human player. This year it was the Robocoach. One here is a back up.

5. Pit Crew(6) - This is so students can work in shifts of 3 people. This lets students have fun and keeps a nice schedule.

6. Scouting(2) - The reason the scouting team is small, is because at any given point, you have your back ups and half of your pit crew available to scout, it'll be great to use them to work.

7. Leadership(?) - If your leadership is not involved above. It's generally a good idea to take your leadership to world. It just helps to have authoritative figures around in a large competition environment.

There, that's around 16 people. And if you have a few other leadership, then you can assume around 18 people. If you want to cut it down EVEN MORE then take away some of the pit crew and replace them with the people who are in the back - up positions.

That should really cut down the number of people attending. But I think that World is an amazing experience and that the more people that are there, the better the experience.