The "FIRST" experience?

[Marc P.]

Cody, I had a similar epiphany after graduating from high school. While you are a student on any given team, your general view of FIRST is confined to how your team operates, whether it be student run, mentor run, or both. The experience on your team sets the benchmark for your view, and a comparison of how other teams are run. Initially, some of the differences may seem unsettling- coming from a team with a student designed and built robot, and seeing the engineer designed/built robots, you tend to wonder if the students on the later team had as enriching an experience as you did. In my first year as a volunteer after graduating, I wondered the same thing. I had the opportunity to see all the teams, without focusing on my own. After a few competitions, and reading some quality discussion here on Chief Delphi, the larger picture started to come into focus.

FIRST's acronym means For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology. The inspiration and recognition are the critical parts of the larger picture. The FRC manual doesn't specify exactly how teams are "supposed" to be run, and it doesn't for a very good reason- no two teams are exactly the same. Some teams have access to machine shop equipment right at their schools, others have access to a sponsor's tools, still others have access to a parent or mentor's home workshop. Some only have hand tools and a table in the back of a storage closet. There are teams with dozens of mentors, and teams with one, or even none (and as Dave says, those teams are missing one of the most critical components of FIRST). It would be impossible to come up with a blanket team structure that could cover all of the possibilities and constraints all of the 1600+ teams out there.

If there were some sort of generic guideline to run a team, it would be to Inspire a Recognition of the importance of Science and Technology in students by any means possible.

At the end of the day (or season), if a student has aspirations to go on to college studying science, math, technology, or anything related to engineering, the team was successful. If a student chooses to go on to college to study something else, but still has an appreciation and understanding of science, math, technology, or anything related to engineering, the team was successful. The process for getting to that point doesn't matter too much, and will vary greatly from team to team. As long as there was some sort of positive impact on the students, FIRST's mission was accomplished.