Admissions Process for becoming a team member??

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Posted by ChrisH at 04/25/2001 1:27 PM EST


Engineer on team #330, Beach 'Bots, from Hope Chapel Academy and NASA JPL, J & F Machine, Raytheon, et al.


In Reply to: Admissions Process for becoming a team member??
Posted by Angela on 04/24/2001 7:34 PM EST:



The process we use depends on the student/engineer ratio. We like to have no more than 3-4 students per technical person.

Everybody, including the engineers, fills out a simple application. Mostly it's contact information, and for returning people it's pretty much a formality. Unless you caused some kind of problem last year. While that won't necessarily keep you off the team, (we do recognize that people ,especially high school students, mature with time) you might have to explain how and why this year will be different.

If there are enough technical people to maintain the ratio, then everybody who applies gets in. If not it may depend as much on your parent's attitude as it does on yours.

We are a small team from a small school that is run by the parents. Consequently we require ALOT of parental involvement. The biggest goal of our application process is to communicate just what kind of commitment the FAMILY is getting into.

One requirement is that each family provide one parent to either work on a fundraising project or provide technical support. So if your parent is unable to make that commitment, we might not have you on our team. Though I don't know of anybody who has been turned away for that reason. After all, our parents are pretty involved in the school anyway.

Because this is a family operation, we take eigth-graders as junior members on a space available basis. While they help with building and fundraising, their travel expenses are not covered by the team. Though they are welcome to come with us if they pay their way, they must also bring their own chaperone.

It is this family commitment that results in our cheering section having people ranging from grandparents to very small children.

Chris Husmann, PE
Team 330 the Beach'Bots