The Growing Gap in FIRST & on CD, and Our Responsibility to Fix It

[Bill_B]

This is a big thread to read for two reasons. First it's sheer size and second by the importance of the topic.

May I suggest a slight wording change to the goal of having an FRC program in every high school? The goal should be to have an FRC program available to every school. We may be overly influenced by the attractiveness of the school system facilities and the already assembled student bodies when considering team formation. Much has already been said here and elsewhere about the volatility of political support. If some of that dependency on the support of elected or appointed officials were to be lessened, I'm sure the sustainability statistics will improve.

Another factor mentioned is team-to-team mentoring. I cannot expand on it here, but I've been thinking for some time that FRC expansion should be a sort of amoeba-like process. By that I mean a new team should have its earliest development while still able to make use of the resources of an already functioning team. Then split off when the "time" is right. This growth model has been working for our planet for a billion years or so. We may be trying to change the culture of celebrating technical success, but we should take the cue for how to do it from Mother Nature, right? I may start a new thread. . - - After build season.

[Doug G]

I'm so glad to hear feedback and serious criticism from alumni, like Jay. This being the 20th year of FIRST, the seeds have been planted and are really taking some deep roots in many of you. Personally, this is our team's 11th year and I had the most alumni participating than ever, not just last year's graduates, but even those going back to 9 years. They are now engineers, starting their own families and are thinking about how to give back. They were in New Hampshire, with their own team, and with us. This is really important!! Recruiting new blood is one way to change our culture, but as FIRST students grow up, they will expect that the school their kid will go to should have a robotics team. If it doesn't they will know what it takes to get one started. This way of starting teams has much more power than forcing some new teacher (or unwilling parent) to take it on.

From a different perspective, many of the schools in the country, do not have a robotics team. Many have commented, that this is OK, quality over quantity. Hogwash!! Every school should have a robotics team (hopefully FIRST or Vex). Afterall we expect schools to have sports and music programs - the same should be expected for competitive STEM outlets. If this doesn't happen - then I really worry about how our country will survive in the global economy.

Why enlist the political folks? Because this mission, needs a kickstart! Will some teams not survive - unfortunately in this economy, yes. They probably should have started with VEX or FTC - much easier programs to sustain. But I don't think that should deter those efforts. I think the push for FTC is more than ever this year (even though I don't like it). Maybe you could just say it's the 20th anniversary, but I bet it makes for much more sustainable program for many school based teams that can't do FRC.

I hope in the next 20 years, at least half of the schools in the country offer a competitive STEM opportunity for students. I hope they include the ideals of FIRST. I see FRC being a bit elitist, like division 1 sports teams. FTC/VEX being like division 2 sports teams.

Please don't give in to the notion of slowing down growth. Be critical, sure. But take the next step as well.... Be a guest speaker to a team and talk about the ideals you worry are going to get missed. Go to regional planning meetings. Make the next 20 years great.

[Nawaid Ladak]

Originally Posted by Jay Trzaskos

*****Another Rant, it's a little harsh*****

...

For those of you stumped on the point of this, 1/5 of all teams competing this season are rookies!!!!! STOP the unchecked growth and look towards sustainability for a change.

If you want to put an FRC team in every American high school, more power to you. If you think that it's going to happen in the next 10 years, you're simply being ignorant. Don't get me wrong, I would love to see this program expand. But at what cost are we expanding? Just because school X has FRC team 3### for 1-2 years doesn't count as putting a team in that school.

It seems that by trying to reach Dean's goal as quickly as possible we're really just leaving students behind.

I agree with this to an extent. I think its much easier to sustain a team rather than create a new one. Sponsors, teachers, school administration, mentors... at least one of these groups of people would be constant. if your creating a new rookie team, there is a chance your starting from scratch, with no experience from any of the four resources listed above.

You have new groups of students every four years. Just like in College Football. how is Ohio State able to sustain their program and continue to grow while a school like the University of South Florida isn't? (No offense to any fans of the USF Bulls). your going to inspire the same amount of kids in the short and long term. But if you fail to sustain a team and rather create a new team. your discouraging the current students on the veteran team. Take it from me, I've been on two teams that have folded. I was in the very small minority that actually decided to go work with another team.

Originally Posted by Tom Line

I think teams have a bit of a different opinion on what exactly defines sustainability.

While I've argued against unchecked growth in the past, I've also questioned my beliefs on the issue and come up with some questions that I can't satisfactorily answer.

I think people need to ask themselves: do I believe it's FIRST's responsibility to partially finance teams? In general I'd argue pretty heavily against it. However, when most people say that FIRST needs to help teams be more sustainable, they mean that FIRST needs to either support the teams financially or to lower the entry costs (which amount to the same thing).

That is the crux of the argument for me right now. FIRST offers enough incentives to join the program. If the learning and real world experience isn't enough, and the excitement and competition isn't enough, the scholarships and friendships certainly should be.

FIRST promotes sustainability by sustaining themselves - the parent organization. If someone can suggest a way to promote sustainability among teams that doesn't require FIRST to hand out more money in some way, then I suspect they'd jump on board.

Okay, how about this idea. What if FIRST was to charge a "stockpile" fee of $1500 for each rookie team when they register for thei rookie season. That money would become available to teams after their third year and would only be used for paying off a portion of registration. Some sort of system like this would take care of financial duties.

I also think the frcteams@usfirst.org account should send out a mass e-mail to teams that have yet to register two weeks before the registration deadline for veteran teams, and again the day after registration is supposed to close. In the e-mail, urge the teams to contact FIRST if they are having any non-monitary issues, such as finding mentors, sponsors, etc. FIRST can then pass the information down to the teams respective regional director and the operation can resume from there.

I think these ideas make the most sense and wouldn't be that hard to implement.

just my $0.02

[pfreivald]

Originally Posted by Bill_B

I cannot expand on it here, but I've been thinking for some time that FRC expansion should be a sort of amoeba-like process. By that I mean a new team should have its earliest development while still able to make use of the resources of an already functioning team. Then split off when the "time" is right.

This sounds suspiciously like the nonprofit I have founded...

[Frenchie461]

Another bit of advice that might help; when anyone new joins robotics, spend an hour or two explaining what first is about, use Kamen's speeches, examples from other years, and how they can be further inspiration, and as always stay graciously professional.

[PayneTrain]

I'm going to use a team 422 has competed against in the last two years at the NJ Regional: Team Overdrive (2753). They are a very stacked, talented, and large team, that went toe-to-toe and beat Veterans in Lunacy and Breakaway, winning in '09 and reaching the semi's in '10. As the emcee reiterated, this team's rookie year was not their first "FIRST" rodeo (heh). This team built upon their success in the Tech Challenge level, then became a very powerful team in FRC.

I don't know about their financial situation, but let's assume they had the drive to be in FIRST, but no money. They wiped the floor in Tech Challenge, building their drive to make a great team, and in that, getting enough sponsorships and memberships to upgrade to FRC.

I think FIRST doesn't push FTC like it should, especially in this shaky financial world. FTC is both a great independent program, and a good gateway into the FRC realm.

[brian3795]

I also think the frcteams@usfirst.org account should send out a mass e-mail to teams that have yet to register two weeks before the registration deadline for veteran teams, and again the day after registration is supposed to close. In the e-mail, urge the teams to contact FIRST if they are having any non-monitary issues, such as finding mentors, sponsors, etc. FIRST can then pass the information down to the teams respective regional director and the operation can resume from there.

Here in the Dallas area, they do exactly that. So we, a rookie team, dutifully told them "sure, we could use mentors and a veteran team to help." Silence. Absolutely nothing.

Of course, at this point it's rather late to send help. We have fortunately been able to find some very good mentors. We were also fortunate to have a veteran team offer to help us during build day (shoutout to Waxahachie Global HS!), but we never really did receive any non-monetary assistance.

Asking for rule clarification on Chief Delphi is like asking someone in a locked room what's on the other side of the door. You can hear

Hear what? The response rate here is certainly faster (and apparently more informative) than requesting a rules clarification via the "official" forum.

[Tom Line]

Originally Posted by brian3795

Here in the Dallas area, they do exactly that. So we, a rookie team, dutifully told them "sure, we could use mentors and a veteran team to help." Silence. Absolutely nothing.

Of course, at this point it's rather late to send help. We have fortunately been able to find some very good mentors. We were also fortunate to have a veteran team offer to help us during build day (shoutout to Waxahachie Global HS!), but we never really did receive any non-monetary assistance.



Hear what? The response rate here is certainly faster (and apparently more informative) than requesting a rules clarification via the "official" forum.

I can't believe that none of the teams in Dallas can spare the time. My first suggestion would be to directly contact teams if you can via phone. Many times a personal request goes further.

We're helping two rookie teams - one is building at our build site and another joins us 1 day a week and we send some of more knowledgable students to them on another day. They're teaching us as much as we're teaching them I think.

In addition, Team 27 (RUSH) and several others run a near-weekly email and call-in where they help rookies with numerous issues that come up.

While I agree about the response time here, that's a direct result of the quality of answer you're likely to get. Q&A have 1/1000th of the people CD does, and Q&A have to research and cross-check every answer they give. Many CD answers are off the cuff, and all of them are non-official, so be careful!