Mentoring Teams 2 hours away from Mentor location.

[Jared Russell]

Hi Marcos,

I was a mentor for Team 341 for 5 years while I attended RIT to get my BS and MS degrees (about 5 hours away). I was the team's only software/controls mentor during this time, as well as one of the primary design mentors. I made about 5 weekend round trips each build season (thankfully I was able to avoid Friday classes every year), plus attending the events.

In 2006 we created a private team forum that we use for much of our team coordination, and working in software, working remotely was possible. I also worked with the mentors at the school to make sure that whenever I could make the trip down, the value of the visit would be maximized (e.g. the machine is put back together so we could get programming time).

This relationship worked because our other mentors were FIRST experts who could help the students build a robot with their eyes closed. I filled the controls niche, while also acting like a "design consultant".

Jared