College student mentors

[nlknauss]

Originally Posted by monkeymel1003

Considering we are comprised of 3 schools, even though there are few people, it's fairly hard to stay organized sometimes.

It sounds like you might want to spend some time working with the teacher and the schools in charge to see what you can do recruit for the future then. Usually the teams who develop decent tactics for recruitment don't need to always worry about transfer of knowledge when an impactful senior class leaves the team. I've seen some great threads on recruitment, might try looking some up. My team is made up of two schools; in the fall we received 150 "interested names" after assemblies and ended up with a team roster of more than 40 students.

As for your current situation, everyone above really did a good job of listing many of the reasons as to why your teacher may have considered this rule. I have the same rule implemented on my team for a few reasons;

(1) district policy states that a volunteer coach must have 60 college credits,
(2) it's hard for a senior to immediately switch over to mentor mode because their classmates don't always buy in, and
(3) to give the graduating senior a chance to build a solid "post high school" start. I'd love to have many of my seniors back next year but it's more important for them to begin the next stage of their life strongly.
(4) Lastly, to give the underclassmen a chance to lead the team the same way the seniors had theirs.

Hopefully that gives you some of the teacher's perspective on this. Let me know if you have any questions.

[Ryan Dognaux]

Purdue FIRST Programs has a rule in place that you cannot mentor the same team you were on in high school for one year after graduating. There is no possible way that the students on the team will see you as a mentor after having been a student on the team the year before. Taking a year off from the team gives you and the team some transition time, and when you come back, you'll be seen differently than you were before.

My suggestion as an incoming college freshman is to just volunteer at regional events and maybe just come in a few times during the build season for design reviews and things of that nature. I mentored a team for three years during college and it has been a great experience, but I'm glad I took that first year off from FIRST to help transition myself.

[Beth Sweet]

I agree with what many are saying here.

I started a team my freshman year of college, and while I wouldn't suggest being in charge of a team that early on, I think it was ok to mentor. That being said, HOT, my HS team, had a "no students returning to mentor" policy. We have had a few kids on the DP go on to mentor and while I love them and they've been great mentors, I almost wish we would have had them wait a year, just to give the kids a bit of time to see them as mentors v. students. There is a definite line that needs to be drawn when you transition and remain on the same team, especially in the eyes of the students whom you will be working with.

As to your situation in particular, I would suggest going about it in a way that would encourage the teacher and lead of your organization to see you as a mature, professional potential mentor. Sit down with that teacher and, rather than saying the policy is dumb etc, list some fact-based reasons why you feel it should be modified. Explain why you would be an exception to the need to wait, perhaps you've demonstrated exceptional maturity while being a student participant, or demonstrate some skill set currently missing from your mentor group.

Best of luck!

[Chris is me]

There is no FIRST rule about this; there are no FIRST rules on how anything could be done with team organization.

I'll talk a little about my situation and you can see if it applies to yours.

Personally, though I'm pretty biased, I think college mentoring is possible, though not on the scale your regular mentors work. Most colleges are on break for the first 3 weeks of build season, and if you don't think I'll at least be trying to stop by 1714's shop to say hi and give a suggestion or two you're sorely mistaken.

You also have the first semester or so to get used to college classes so you'll be able to tell if you can handle it. Personally I've been lucky enough to have been taking two college classes a semester for the last two years, so I guess I've had an easier transition into tougher classes and workloads. Four college classes, I've heard, is roughly equal to 2 college classes and 4 high school classes (I have brothers who did the same thing), so I'm reasonably sure I'll be able to handle it.

Part of the reason I think I might be able to help out 1714 in the skills I'm good at (programming / strategy), though, is that the programming group is going to be almost all new people this year, and many of the rookie members kind of sort of look up to me. I was a leader for one of our rookie Vex teams this year, so having me in a mentor-like role isn't an entirely alien experience.

So if you think you'll be able to throw your break away for your team, handle all of the stress of college on top of helping out your FIRST team, and be able to actually _act_ as a mentor around people barely younger than you, then it is certainly possible.

[OScubed]

I would suggest before you decide to mentor as a College student that you THOROUGHLY read and understand this thread. which specifically addressed this issue. It is stickied at the top of the forum for a reason.